>Ross was smeared with false, unprosecuted allegations of planning murder-for-hire that much of the media amplified through inaccurate and sensationalized reporting. The allegations were never charged at trial, never proven, never submitted to, or ruled on by, a jury, and eventually dismissed with prejudice.
The website is called "free Ross Ulbricht," they aren't quiet about their bias.
>none of this is utilizing actual facts,
"The allegations were never charged at trial, never proven, never submitted to, or ruled on by, a jury, and eventually dismissed with prejudice" are the actual facts.
Being proud of your bias doesn’t absolve you of its fact corruption effect, that is just silly. If anything it makes you more likely to stretch the truth.
The fact remains that someone should be considered innocent of a crime until proven guilty. If the prosecution couldn't prove that he hired a hitman (sounds like they didn't even try), then that shouldn't influence his sentencing.
That’s not how it works. The evidentiary standard for a jury is “beyond a reasonable doubt” but for the sentencing judge is “preponderance of the evidence”, with the caveat that the judge can’t use that to hand down a sentence harsher than legally permitted by what the jury convicted on (in this case narcotics distribution - resulting in deaths of overdose victims).
At the very least, the 2 agents involved in his case being found to be corrupt and having forged evidence, should cast additional doubt on the murder for hire.
I'm not saying he didn't do it, but had that been known at the time, I think it would have been less decided that his sentencing should take the alleged murders for hire into account.
He should be tried for that separately at this point
It went to appeal and all those points were addressed. But I agree that it would have been much better to actually prosecute those murder-for-hire charges. Even if acquitted, the judge can still take the accusations into account during sentencing (due to the different evidentiary standards).
It objectively compares his sentence of 2 lifetimes + 40 years to the sentences of the biggest actual drug dealers on silk road, as well as the founders of the bigger silk road 2.0, all of whom got less than 10 years. I would consider that to be satisfactory actual fact utilization.
US judges are free to sentence a convict for allegations of which he was acquitted. Sentencing him for allegations that were dismissed isn't really different.
The article linked here addresses that multiple times. That accusation, largely overinflated by the media, was dismissed with prejudice. He was never even charged with it.
The article conflates the case in Maryland, which was dismissed after Ulbricht was already convicted and his appeals denied by SCOTUS.
The article pretends this exonerated Ross when it reality the government didn't see a reason to go through another trial when he was already serving multiple life sentences.
The article also does the hand-waivey "it was never shown the messages were authored by Ross."
Those messages were presented into evidence, during the trial. Ross lawyers had no explanation for them.
The FBI accepted that multiple people were behind the DreadPirateRoberts account and that the writing style did not match his. He was ultimately not charged with it, but the story was used to slander him and make him seem dangerous and violent.