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posted by martyb on Tuesday December 08 2015, @03:52PM   Printer-friendly
from the looking-for-silkworms? dept.

Roger Thomas Clark, an adviser to Ross Ulbricht, creator of the Silk Road darknet marketplace, has been arrested in Thailand. Clark faces extradition to the U.S. and charges of narcotics and money laundering conspiracy:

A man alleged to have helped run the notorious Silk Road drug marketplace has been arrested in Thailand. Canadian Roger Thomas Clark is said to have been a key adviser for Silk Road creator Ross Ulbricht. The US Department of Justice alleged that Mr Clark advised Ulbricht about the best way to run the site and how to evade the police. The Silk Road website was shut down in late 2013 following raids by the FBI and other law enforcement agencies.

[...] The DoJ alleges that Mr Clark was a "high-ranking" operator on the Silk Road and was instrumental in helping Ulbricht run it. He gave advice about ways to improve the technology underpinning the site, boost sales and on the best way for Ulbricht to hide his real identity, said US authorities. Mr Clark was paid "at least hundreds of thousands of dollars" for this advice, said the DoJ in a statement announcing the arrest. [...] On the site and in other underground forums, Mr Clark is believed to have used several nicknames including "Variety Jones, "VJ", "Cimon" and "Plural of Mongoose".

From the DOJ press release:

CLARK repeatedly advocated the use of intimidation and violence to keep members of the Silk Road support staff from cooperating with law enforcement. In one such conversation, in which CLARK and Ulbricht discussed "track[ing] down" a certain Silk Road employee to ensure that he had not gone "[o]ff the rails," CLARK commented, "[D]ude, we're criminal drug dealers – what line shouldn't we cross?"

[...] CLARK, 54, a citizen of Canada, is charged with one count of narcotics conspiracy, which carries a maximum sentence of life in prison and a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years, and one count of money laundering conspiracy, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.

Meanwhile, Shaun Bridges, a Secret Service agent who pleaded guilty to stealing $820,000 worth of Bitcoins from the Silk Road, has been sentenced to 6 years in prison.


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  • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 08 2015, @05:37PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 08 2015, @05:37PM (#273508)
    Starting Score:    0  points
    Moderation   +1  
       Informative=1, Total=1
    Extra 'Informative' Modifier   0  

    Total Score:   1  
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 08 2015, @05:39PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 08 2015, @05:39PM (#273509)

    Oh how could I forget this too:
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evo_Morales_grounding_incident [wikipedia.org]

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 08 2015, @07:41PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 08 2015, @07:41PM (#273585)

    So, wait. What's your point? A Russian steals $100M from US citizens and businesses, and they grab him with cooperation of local officials. So what is your point? That one can commit any crime against a state and as long as they stay out of that state, no repercussions?

    So what are your thoughts on the Samuel Sheinbein [washingtonpost.com] case? He brutally murders someone and cuts up their bodies into parts. When the police start taking a look at him, his father flies him (a Jew) off to Israel (where he had never been before) and claims protection as a citizen of Israel. At first Israel wasn't going to do anything, including sending him back. Even the people of Israel got pissed off and they ended up trying him in Israel. But you would seem to say that nothing should have happened to him. He was "on base" and safe, so to speak.

    You have a very provincial world view. There IS a bigger world out there, you know.

    • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 08 2015, @09:10PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 08 2015, @09:10PM (#273623)

      May be read the title of his comment to spot the difference with your example.