When accused fraudster Sam Bankman-Fried was first outed, cryptocurrency activist Erik Vorhees took to Twitter to make a point:
“Build a website that lets consenting adults buy recreational drugs = 2 life sentences + 15 years. Build a website that steals $10 billion from innocent people = hugs with politicians and celebrity endorsements.”
The latter is a reference to Sam Bankman-Fried, the 30-year-old crypto whiz kid now charged with one of the most massive financial frauds in U.S. history but until recently was still the subject of sympathetic profile pieces on his family, fashion and hairstyle.
The former refers to Ross Ulbricht, creator of the now-defunct Silk Road website, who just spent his 10th Christmas behind bars. And Vorhees got it wrong: Ulbricht is serving a double-life-plus-40-year prison sentence.
Friends, family and those familiar with the case say enough is enough. They are asking President Biden to consider commuting the remainder of Ulbricht’s sentence, and a Change.org petition has more than half a million signatures in support.
“Ross has matured and learned so much during his time in prison,” said Ross’s mother, Lyn. “He is not the same 26-year-old who created Silk Road, something he profoundly regrets. I know that, if given a second chance, Ross would never break the law again.”
Silk Road was one of the first darknet online marketplaces where vendors sold drugs and other legal and illegal items and services in exchange for Bitcoin, a barely known cryptocurrency at the time. According to court records, vendors moved more than $183 million worth of drugs between the site’s creation in 2011 and Ross Ulbricht’s arrest in 2013.
A first-time offender, he was convicted of all non-violent offenses as the site creator, including narcotics distribution conspiracy and money laundering conspiracy. And while Ulbricht was not convicted of selling anything or laundering money himself, he remains in prison for life while the dealers who sold drugs on Silk Road and were nabbed by authorities have already completed their sentences and are out of prison.
In the United Kingdom, the creator of Silk Road 2.0, an identical platform but only larger, was sentenced to five years and four months.
“After spending many years in prison, with people whose lives have been destroyed by drugs, Ross says he would never facilitate or support drug use in any way again,” Lyn Ulbricht said. “Instead, he has been dedicated to helping his fellow prisoners quit drugs and turn their lives around. Ross wants nothing more than to make amends for his past actions.”
Currently held at a high-security penitentiary in Arizona, Ross Ulbricht has been a model prisoner with no disciplinary actions on his record, his mother said. He has also nurtured his talent as an artist, and his family launched a charitable initiative, Art4Giving, funded by auctions of non-fungible tokens (digital assets based on blockchain technology) of his artwork to support drug addiction prevention and treatment as well as prison visits, education and societal re-entry support for prisoners and their families.
The effort to free Ross Ulbricht has support from a wide spectrum of writers, politicians of all stripes, prominent members of the clergy, and more. Sister Helen Prejean, the renowned criminal justice reform advocate made famous by the Academy Award-winning 1995 film “Dead Man Walking,” said the sentence is fundamentally unjust.
“A commutation of Ross Ulbricht’s sentence would be celebrated by many of us who care about justice, fairness and mercy,” Prejean wrote on the FreeRoss.org website.
Another statement from “John Wick” star Keanu Reeves says, “The Silk Road and trial of Ross Ulbricht involve many important and complex issues that impact the life of Mr. Ulbricht and us all.”
The government’s case claims, and Ross Ulbricht admits, that he oversaw and managed Silk Road during its operation, including deciding what could be sold on the site and managing customer support staff, according to court records.
When the FBI arrested Ross Ulbricht at a public library, he was found logged into Silk Road as Dread Pirate Roberts, the handle used by the site’s top administrator. A search of his laptop revealed evidence linking Ross Ulbricht to Silk Road’s creation, ownership and operation.
Ulbricht’s family is heartened by the growing public support, and they hope that in the new year the Biden administration will decide to heed the call for clemency.
“Parents hope that their children will not make reckless and destructive mistakes in their youth. My son did make a terrible mistake, but we fervently hope he won’t pay for it with his life, that he will be granted mercy and a second chance to prove the good he can do,” Lyn Ulbricht said.
