Thread by @RealSpikeCohen

This is Ross Ulbricht. If you've heard his story, you're probably getting upset just thinking about it.

For those who haven't, Ross is serving a 2x life sentence plus 40 years, for creating a website.

If that sounds ridiculous & infuriating to you, keep reading. It gets worse.

Ross created a website called Silk Road, which he designed to be a free market, secure, anonymous marketplace. It used Bicoin for payment, and utilized a system called Tor which allowed buyers and sellers to access it anonymously and without any trace.

An avid libertarian, Ross prohibited anything being sold on Silk Road that violated the Non-Aggression Principle. This included stolen items, counterfeit/fraudulent items, child pornography, etc. A devout believer in nonviolence, Ross also prohibited the sale of weapons.

Many items that were sold on Silk Road were legal, and a third-party study of the site inventory by Carnegie-Mellon University concluded that the drugs most commonly sold were user amounts of cannabis.

Most importantly, Ross was not convicted for selling, buying, or being in proximity to any of the items that were sold on Silk Road, legal or illegal. Rather he was convicted for what others did on the site.

According to the Drug Policy Alliance, the ability to purchase drugs on Silk Road was "a peaceable alternative to the often deadly violence so commonly associated with the global drug war, and street drug transactions, in particular." Much safer to buy drugs at home.

On 10/2013, Ross was arrested by the FBI & charged with money laundering conspiracy, computer hacking conspiracy, fake ID trafficking conspiracy & narcotics trafficking. Ross did not launder money, hack computers or sell illegal items himself, and was never accused of it.

After his arrest, the prosecution alleged that Ross attempted to have several people killed, but never charged him for this at trial. All his trial charges were nonviolent.

An unprosecuted indictment in Maryland, including the only murder-for-hire allegation ever filed, was dismissed with prejudice by the prosecutors. The only "victim" ever identified, Curtis Green, publicly states that the allegations were false. He is a fervent supporter of Ross.

Despite the fact that these false, unproven allegations were never prosecuted, the federal government used them in the media to paint Ross as a violent criminal kingpin, despite the fact that he was nonviolent & lived a very meager life, living with 3 roommates in an apartment.

The FBI also seized over 144,000 Bitcoin that they found in a shared wallet on Ross's computer, which today is worth over $1.6 billion.

Let's face it, that's the reason they did all of this: to rob him.

During Ross's trial:

1. The prosecution never had to prove Ross authored any of the online anonymous chats & text files the murder-for-hire accusations solely relied on. Evidence & testimony showing that multiple people ran the website was banned from being discussed at trial.

2. Ross's defense team was not allowed to cross-examine the prosecution's witnesses or present their own witnesses.

3. Key exonerating evidence was blocked by the judge.

4. The prosecution was permitted to allege to the jury that Ross had hired hits on people despite never charging him with this or allowing him the opportunity to defend himself, a constitutional right.

The jury found Ross guilty, & the judge sentenced this 1st-time, nonviolent offender to double life plus 40 years without parole.

After trial, 2 key investigating agents were convicted on corruption charges related to his case. Their existence was hidden from jury during trial.

Despite all of this, Ross’s conviction was lost on appeal, and the Supreme Court refused to hear his case.
There is no other way to say it: Ross was railroaded by a corrupt federal government that wanted to make an example of him and steal his Bitcoins.

During his 7 years in prison, Ross has continued to be a model citizen, teaching classes and tutoring his fellow inmates and helping them to earn their GEDs. He has also completed several educational programs himself and has never received a single disciplinary sanction.

Ross Ulbricht is a peaceful, nonviolent man who has never harmed anyone and whose only "crime" was to create a website that some used to sell drugs that shouldn't be illegal in the first place.

Ross needs to be set free NOW.

@VerminSupreme and I are calling for President Trump to have his prison time commuted to time served and for him to be let go, and we call on all other Presidential and Vice Presidential candidates to join us in calling for this.

If elected, Vermin and I will give Ross and all other victims of the War on Drugs a full pardon, and we call on all other Presidential and Vice Presidential candidates to make the same pledge.

FreeRoss.com