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“I am Special Agent Chris Tarbell with the FBI,” he said as he spun a handcuffed Ross back
around, placing his hand on Ross’s chest to ensure he wasn’t having a heart attack or any other
emergency. “Do you have any medical conditions? Do you need any medical attention?”
“No, I’m fine,” Ross said. The shock of the moment had already worn off and Ross was now
nonchalant, as if this was just a small bump in the road. “What am I being charged with?” he asked,
knowing full well that the cops could have grabbed him for any number of reasons. Maybe it was the
fake IDs he had ordered or something innocuous related to the Silk Road.
“We’ll go over that in the car,” Tarbell replied, “once we get you off the street.”
FBI cars and vans from the local FBI squad now screeched in from all angles and directions onto
Diamond Street, with almost thirty agents swarming in every direction. Tarbell walked Ross toward
an undercover van that was stopped in the middle of the road as Jared walked back upstairs to check
the laptop they had seized during the arrest.
The library was quiet again as Jared made it to the seat next to Thom, who was taking photos for
the arrest report. As Jared scanned the screen, he saw it. The other side of the chat that he had been
engaged in with DPR a few minutes earlier. The computer was logged in, using Tor, on the Silk Road
support page and on a dashboard called Mastermind, which displayed a bounty of millions and
millions of dollars in Bitcoins. Off to the right there was a chat window, which was midway through
a conversation with Cirrus—Jared’s undercover account—and there was the name of the man he had
been chatting with: “Dread.” The computer was called “Frosty.”
“Holy shit,” Jared said aloud.
Downstairs Tarbell helped Ross into the backseat of the undercover van. “You asked what you’re
being charged with,” Tarbell said. A woman sat in the front seat wearing an FBI jacket, and behind
her a child’s seat sat empty. Next to it Ross was now settling in with his hands cuffed behind his back.
Tarbell then lifted up a piece of paper and held it in front of Ross’s face for him to read. As Ross
looked at the page, he saw the words written across the top:
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
-v.-
ROSS WILLIAM ULBRICHT
a/k/a “Dread Pirate Roberts,”
a/k/a “DPR,”
a/k/a “Silk Road.”
Ross’s eyes narrowed as he looked at Tarbell and uttered four words. “I want a lawyer.”