Silk Road Website Founder Ross Ulbricht Sentenced to Life in Prison For Online Drug Trade

The accused mastermind and founder of the Silk Road website, identified as Ross Ulbricht, has been sentenced to life in prison on Wednesday after he was found guilty of using the website to make online drug sales that amounted to over $200 million.

The 31-year-old was sentenced by United States District Judge Katherine Forrest after a federal jury found him guilty of charges such as drug distribution and money laundering last February. The transactions were reportedly made using digital currency bitcoin.

The Silk Road underground website was used to commit computer hacking, money laundering, and drug distribution. Judge Forrest said during the hearing, "And in breaking that ground as the first person, you sit here as the defendant having to pay the consequences for that."

Ross Ulbricht admitted that he created the Silk Road website but denied that he was part of the ongoing transactions. He pointed out to the judge that he did not create the website out of greed but instead, he created it to empower people and to let them have anonymity and privacy. However, prosecutors handling the case said that the Silk Road website has been in operation for two years and it allowed users to anonymously buy drugs and other illegal goods.

The members of the website communicated via the Tor network in which the location and identity of the person is concealed. Also, using the bitcoin as payment does not give any lead regarding one's location and identity.

The prosecutors also shared that Ulbricht, who is a Texas native, took a lot of extreme steps in order to protect the underground website he has built. He reportedly even solicited murders to the people who posted threats against his website. However, these murders remain to be unproven.

Joshua Dratel, lawyer for Ulbricht said that they will forward an appeal to the court as the sentence is unreasonable and unjust. Dratel pointed out that his client already gave the website to other people as it was too stressful to handle but he was lured back in for him to take all the blame before its October 2013 discovery.

There are reportedly at least six people who died from overdoses from the drugs they bought from the Silk Road website.