his role as one of the administrators and forum moderators who
helped run now-defunct dark web marketplace “Silk
Road[1].”
Gary
Davis[2], 31, of Wicklow,
Ireland, was known as ‘Libertas’ on the Silk Road website,
then-largest underground black marketplace on the Internet used by
thousands of people to buy and sell drugs and other illegal goods
and services.
Silk Road site administrators were responsible for, among other
things, monitoring user activity on the underground website for any
problem, responding to customer service inquiries, and resolving
any dispute between buyers and vendors.
Davis was indicted by U.S. federal prosecutors in 2013 when
authorities shut down the Silk
Road[3] website and arrested its
founder Ross William
Ulbricht[4], who was sentenced to
life in
prison[5] in 2015 after being
convicted on multiple counts related to the black marketplace.
“During its operation from 2011 until 2013, Silk Road was used by
thousands of drug dealers and other unlawful vendors to distribute
over $200 million worth of illegal drugs and other illicit goods
and services to more than 115,000 buyers, and to launder hundreds
of millions of dollars derived from those unlawful transactions,”
the DoJ said.
Road[6] between June 2013 and
October 2, 2013, was then arrested in Ireland in January 2014. He
fought extradition in Irish courts but got extradited last year
from the Republic of Ireland to the United States.
In October 2018, Davis finally
pleaded guilty to drug trafficking charges, “one count of
conspiracy to distribute narcotics,” a felony that carries a
maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.
[7]
However, the United States federal court has now imposed a prison
sentence of 78 months on Davis, according to a press
release[8] published Thursday by
the U.S. Department of Justice.
Besides his prison term, Davis has also been ordered to serve
three years of supervised release and pay $25,000 in fine.
“Davis’s arrest, extradition from Ireland, conviction, and prison
sentence should send an unmistakable message: the dark web does not
cast shadows long enough to protect criminals from the long arm of
the law,” Manhattan U.S. Attorney Geoffrey S. Berman said.
Bitcoins[9] (worth about $33.6
million, at the time), which were later sold in a series of
auctions[10] by the United States
Marshals Service (USMS).
References
- ^
Silk Road
(thehackernews.com) - ^
Gary Davis
(thehackernews.com) - ^
shut down the Silk Road
(thehackernews.com) - ^
Ross William Ulbricht
(thehackernews.com) - ^
life in prison
(thehackernews.com) - ^
Silk Road
(thehackernews.com) - ^
Davis finally pleaded guilty
(thehackernews.com) - ^
press release
(www.justice.gov) - ^
seized Bitcoins
(thehackernews.com) - ^
sold in a series of auctions
(thehackernews.com)
Read more http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheHackersNews/~3/EOWQY8UeFVg/silk-road-dark-web-admin.html