34856893457934

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Ross’s days now often begin before the sun rises, with the sounds of keys and the door to each prison cell unlocking. His cell is only a few feet deep and half as wide. The walls of the prison, which are mostly thick orange concrete blocks, are a brooding and formidable sight. Ross wakes up, slips on his prison clothes, and walks out into the general population. The days are tediously regimented, with an hour allocated for breakfast, thirty minutes for lunch, and the same for supper. Meals are served on plastic trays, with divots on the sides for plastic forks or spoons, plastic cups, and pats of margarine. The commissary at the prison sells snacks, drinks, and clothing. Ross, using the money his mother has placed into his account, can sometimes buy candy and sodas or a new pair of sneakers or sweatpants. Inmates like Ross, who are well behaved inside, are given an hour outside to walk in circles on the roof of the prison, where a cage encloses the air. In the evening Ross is ushered back into his cell, and the bolts on the doors slam tight. The concrete room is thrust into darkness. After Ross was arrested, the Silk Road Web site was promptly shut down. But it took only a few weeks before a new Silk Road 2.0 opened for business, with a new Dread Pirate Roberts at the helm of the ship. When that was subsequently shut down by the Feds, another Silk Road appeared, along with hundreds of other Web sites that anonymously sell drugs online. The people who run these Web sites see themselves as part of a movement, and some believe what they are doing is making the world a safer place. Maybe it’s just a justification; or maybe it’s not. In 2015, the year that Ross was sentenced to life in prison, a group of university researchers concluded a 67,000-hour study that involved interviewing 100,000 people around the world about their drug use. One of the questions in the survey asked people how they got their drugs. With that data the researchers noted that the year after the Silk Road opened for business, as many as 20 percent of respondents started to purchase drugs online. When the researchers asked these people why they chose to buy drugs on the Internet and not on the street, the users explained that they were nearly six times more likely to be physically harmed on the street. Clearly Ross had fulfilled the goal that had led him to start the Silk Road, and tens of thousands of people feel safer being able to buy drugs online. But as with all technologies, there is a good side and a bad. Also in 2015, another study was released. This one was by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which said that for the first time in recent history, more people had died from heroin- and opioid-related drug overdoses in America than from gun deaths. As news reports noted, sometimes accompanied by chilling videos taken from smartphones, in hundreds of incidents of overdoses, children are left orphaned. One of the reasons for the rise in deaths was due to the ease with which people could now gain access to synthetic opioids, like fentanyl, that are made in labs in China. These drugs are fifty to one hundred times stronger than traditional heroin and users often misjudge how much to inject, which inevitably leads to a fatal overdose. The charts the CDC released along with its report, illustrating the number of people who had died from these synthetic opioids, were not too dissimilar to those showing the profits and revenues from the Silk Road, with an abrupt line pointing upward and off to the right. Often when news articles are written about studies related to online drug-buying, the stories mention Ross Ulbricht as the pioneer at the forefront of this new world. The links from the stories will eventually lead readers to an obscure video online that was recorded a few years earlier at the Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco. In the video Ross is talking to his old friend from
high school, René, about their future outlook on life. The video is slightly out of focus, and while the two friends seem to be in the same conversation, it appears that Ross is talking about someone else. “Do you think you’re going to live forever?” René asks. There’s a brief contemplative pause, then Ross Ulbricht looks at the camera and answers, “I think it’s a possibility. I honestly do. I think I might live forever in some form.”
Page 3 and 4:
Portfolio/Penguin An imprint of Pen
Page 5 and 6:
No man, for any considerable period
Page 7 and 8:
20. The Dread Pirate Roberts 21. Ca
Page 9 and 10:
Author’s Note My mother, who pass
Page 11 and 12:
PART I
Page 13 and 14:
look for anything out of the ordina
Page 15 and 16:
pills that had been arriving, week
Page 17 and 18:
Five Years Earlier
Page 19 and 20:
hand in marriage (Say yes, please s
Page 21 and 22:
Chapter 3 JULIA VIE Julia Vie’s f
Page 23 and 24:
“Oh, no, no, no,” Julia said as
Page 25 and 26:
American drug laws. “Take your se
Page 27 and 28:
His hope was that this gig would le
Page 29 and 30:
Chapter 6 THE BONFIRE Ross swerved
Page 31 and 32:
As they joined the group around the
Page 33 and 34:
Chapter 7 THE SILK ROAD Stuff, to R
Page 35 and 36:
computer screen, he daydreamed that
Page 37 and 38:
to push Ross’s intelligence, with
Page 39 and 40:
“We should go,” he said to Juli
Page 41 and 42:
at the University of Texas, and ask
Page 43 and 44:
Chapter 10 WHAT GOES UP MUST COME D
Page 45 and 46:
Now, rather than split his time amo
Page 47 and 48:
enough, someone was. You could buy
Page 49 and 50:
Chapter 12 A BULL’S-EYE ON MY BAC
Page 51 and 52:
transaction. This would require rew
Page 53 and 54:
libertarian theory. When the tête-
Page 55 and 56:
Chapter 14 WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?! Tea
Page 57 and 58:
Chapter 15 JARED AND THE FIFTY-TON
Page 59 and 60:
themselves. The issue, Jared reiter
Page 61 and 62:
A few days before he left for Austr
Page 63 and 64:
Chapter 17 CARL FORCE’S TOMORROW
Page 65 and 66:
Carl thought about it for a moment.
Page 67 and 68:
Ross interacted with dozens of diff
Page 69 and 70:
caught up in the conversation to se
Page 71 and 72:
Then there was the challenge of buy
Page 73 and 74:
Chapter 20 THE DREAD PIRATE ROBERTS
Page 75 and 76:
What a brilliant idea. Ross loved i
Page 77 and 78:
He soon realized that this site cou
Page 79 and 80:
people, the risk was worth the rewa
Page 81 and 82:
Ross’s cut from the commission fe
Page 83 and 84:
Chapter 24 CARL, ELADIO, AND NOB Fo
Page 85 and 86:
Chapter 25 JARED’S CHICAGO VERSUS
Page 87 and 88:
The Baltimore attorney then explain
Page 89 and 90:
commission,” Ross wrote in a lett
Page 91 and 92:
world businesses when a CEO is oust
Page 93 and 94:
Nope. Not going to happen. Carl had
Page 95 and 96:
This place was special to Ross for
Page 97 and 98:
Chapter 29 VARIETY JONES GOES TO SC
Page 99 and 100:
him break a drug dependency, and en
Page 101 and 102:
But if Ross wanted to keep growing
Page 103 and 104:
Chapter 31 ROSS SILENCES JULIA Ross
Page 105 and 106:
away. Heading into the darkness, al
Page 107 and 108:
Chapter 32 CHRIS TARBELL, FBI A que
Page 109 and 110:
took his SATs in high school he did
Page 111 and 112:
After breakfast each morning, while
Page 113 and 114:
other start-up in the city would ha
Page 115 and 116:
There were two main aspects of the
Page 117 and 118:
Chapter 35 BATTEN DOWN THE HATCHES!
Page 119 and 120:
For the backup plan to the backup p
Page 121 and 122:
the site had grown, DPR’s message
Page 123 and 124:
This wasn’t a vacation. It was hi
Page 125 and 126:
When his new friends asked Ross wha
Page 127 and 128:
Chapter 38 CARL LIKES DPR On paper
Page 129 and 130:
are safe from the laws of your nati
Page 131 and 132:
Chapter 39 KIDNEY FOR SALE! Ross st
Page 133 and 134:
On the black market a person’s ki
Page 135 and 136:
Chapter 40 THE WHITE HOUSE IN UTAH
Page 137 and 138:
pup, tried to bite another agent’
Page 139 and 140:
Chihuahuas. Green went on like a sc
Page 141 and 142:
Chapter 42 THE FIRST MURDER Ross ha
Page 143 and 144:
started to wonder if he might not h
Page 145 and 146:
usts with physical drugs, not digit
Page 147 and 148:
Portland, looked like she was going
Page 149 and 150:
into the hospital room as they wept
Page 151 and 152:
Chapter 45 GARY ALFORD, IRS The sid
Page 153 and 154:
He started with the Gawker article,
Page 155 and 156:
It was, after all, his legacy, the
Page 157 and 158:
Chapter 47 GARY’S BIG CHANGE Ever
Page 159 and 160:
to go and feed a parking meter. So
Page 161 and 162:
you were only giving them half of y
Page 163 and 164:
“Let me tell you a little parable
Page 165 and 166:
your side” capacity—tried to wa
Page 167 and 168:
Chapter 50 A PARKING TICKET ON THE
Page 169 and 170:
Another search showed that Ross Ulb
Page 171 and 172:
unclear what, if anything, was on t
Page 173 and 174:
Chapter 52
Page 175 and 176:
take a few breaks to watch Louis C.
Page 177 and 178:
The agent asked again. “Andrew Fo
Page 179 and 180:
Chris Tarbell had decided he wouldn
Page 181 and 182:
By the end of Jared’s presentatio
Page 183 and 184:
Chapter 54 JARED BECOMES CIRRUS Whe
Page 185 and 186:
plastic. When the woman from Texas
Page 187 and 188:
Chapter 55 JULIA IS SAVED! HALLELUJ
Page 189 and 190: Chapter 56
Page 191 and 192: Dylan waited for Ross to respond, b
Page 193 and 194: Chapter 57 ONWARD TO FEDERAL PLAZA
Page 195 and 196: Angels to have people killed, and h
Page 197 and 198: Chapter 58 JULIA COMES TO SAN FRANC
Page 199 and 200: She nonchalantly came up the stairs
Page 201 and 202: “We’re going to read from the T
Page 203 and 204: Chapter 60 THE PHONE CALL Gary sat
Page 205 and 206: She turned back to her computer and
Page 207 and 208: Dread Pirate Roberts was a twenty-n
Page 209 and 210: caught in a tree in the park and ha
Page 211 and 212: Chapter 62 THE PINK SUNSET Pink. Th
Page 213 and 214: was logged in to the site and arres
Page 215 and 216: even stop crossing the line, Carl d
Page 217 and 218: Even if anyone had noticed the SUV
Page 219 and 220: laptop and find a spot in a cafe wh
Page 221 and 222: “Sure,” DPR wrote. “Let me lo
Page 223 and 224: “I am Special Agent Chris Tarbell
Page 225 and 226: Thom and the other agent started ch
Page 227 and 228: And then there was Julia, who had p
Page 229 and 230: Chapter 68 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
Page 231 and 232: The defense knew an insurmountable
Page 233 and 234: He continued walking through the sp
Page 235 and 236: man. Gravity doesn’t care if you
Page 237 and 238: Chapter 71 THE PLURAL OF MONGOOSE I
Page 239: Chapter 72 THE MUSEUM Along Pennsyl
Page 243 and 244: the perils lovingly and yet resolut
Page 245 and 246: For over a year after the Silk Road
Page 247 and 248: Young Ross in elementary school in
Page 249 and 250: Ross with his parents, Lyn and Kirk
Page 251 and 252: The NOMMO Club at Penn State Univer
Page 253 and 254: The Silk Road Web site, which offer
Page 255 and 256: Jared Der-Yeghiayan of the Departme
Page 257 and 258: Force disguised as Nob, his online
Page 259 and 260: Chris Tarbell of the Federal Bureau
Page 261 and 262: Curtis Green, known on the Silk Roa
Page 263 and 264: Curtis Green’s staged murder, an
Page 265 and 266: Notes on Reporting Each and every d
Page 267 and 268: Acknowledgments I’d like to start
Page 269 and 270: Bibliography Bauer, Alex. “My Roo
Page 271: What’s next on your reading list?
show all

34856893457934

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?