• twistypencil@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    I didn’t even notice that this happened:

    Today, President Biden granted Leonard Peltier executive clemency and commuted the remainder of his sentence.

    • Akasazh@feddit.nl
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      1 day ago

      commuted the remainder of his sentence.

      Commuted it to home fucking arrest, not even full clemancy.

  • jeffw@lemmy.worldM
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    2 days ago

    Anyone else remember the panic when you logged in and saw the notice that the site was seized by the feds?

    I mean, certainly not something I experienced but I’m sure if I had it would’ve been terrifying to think the feds could find your info

  • Treczoks@lemmy.world
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    22 hours ago

    Didn’t Donald the Jester say something about fighting crime before the election? And then he drops thousands of hard criminals back on the street?

  • Rhoeri@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    It’s so easy to see who bough his bitcoin “scam” now, isn’t it?

      • Eezyville@sh.itjust.works
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        1 day ago

        Of course they do. This is how they cope with anything Trump related. They come up with conspiracy theories.

              • Eezyville@sh.itjust.works
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                1 day ago

                I don’t think that Ulbricht had the capability to bribe Trump. I think that Lemmy and Reddit users are trying to justify Trump’s pardon by saying it was done through illegal activity (bribery) instead of campaign promises. That’s why I say they are making up conspiracy theories. Now I believe he can be bribed because of all the felonies he got from issuing bribes.

                • MothmanDelorian@lemmy.world
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                  24 hours ago

                  Gotcha, I still think he got paid for this because Ross was in for hiring a hitman which is an odd thing for Trump to pardon.

        • Spookyghost@sh.itjust.works
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          1 day ago

          Kodak black paid 2mil for a pardon the first time. This is highly likely to be true, you are either uniformed, a bot, or in on the grift.

          • _cryptagion@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            1 day ago

            Ross was an idiot, that’s why he was caught. They seized all his remaining bitcoin, what hadn’t been stolen by hackers because, again, he was an idiot and the Silk Road was slapped together from code cobbled from other places. There’s no way the dude was smart enough to set some aside for bribes in case he got caught, because he was so sure he wouldn’t that he advertised the Silk Road using his personal email with his real name in forum posts.

            While I don’t think he deserved life in prison, he sure as hell ended up there because of how ridiculously idiotic he was. The dude isn’t smart enough to be a manager at Arby’s, let alone run a criminal enterprise.

            • NSRXN@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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              23 hours ago

              they didn’t catch him because of bad opsec, unless you consider Tor to be bad opsec. they caught him with a parallel reconstruction after the NSA illegally spied on him.

              change my mind

              • _cryptagion@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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                22 hours ago

                You can watch any documentary on Silk Road. Or for that matter, the Wikipedia article says the same damn thing. But I don’t need to change your mind. You’re some random person on the internet, nothing any of us says really matters to anyone else here. Believe it or don’t, it’s up to you.

            • Sturgist@lemmy.ca
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              1 day ago

              isn’t smart enough to be a manager at Arby’s

              Hey buddy, chill, there’s almost certainly talented doctors from other countries who couldn’t afford to recertify managing at least 2 Arby’s…and those will be the only 2 you don’t get food poisoning from.

              • _cryptagion@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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                1 day ago

                That is completely missing my point. I’m sure there’s literal rocket scientists who have had to work at Arby’s to make ends meet, but that has nothing to do with Ross lacking the intellect to properly manage one. We’re not talking about immigrant doctors in this thread.

                • Sturgist@lemmy.ca
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                  1 day ago

                  Sure, or you can read my comment again and realise the joke I was making.

          • Eezyville@sh.itjust.works
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            1 day ago
            1. How did he pay all that money while in prison?
            2. Where are you getting your facts about Ross from besides your ass?
              • Eezyville@sh.itjust.works
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                1 day ago

                This is incredibly stupid. Prison officials will do everything they can to prevent an inmate from moving around assets for VERY OBVIOUS reasons. But, after thinking about it, it may not be so obvious for this echo chamber so let me explain the obvious.

                You are an inmate in prison. You made millions doing your illegal thing while free but you hare now doing hard time. You don’t like hard time, you want easy or no time. How do you make your life better while in prison. Wait, you have millions. You’ll just use that money to have your way with the guards and prison system. Guard giving you trouble? Use your assets that you’ve amassed to “get rid of them”.

                The prison system has protocols and processes in place to prevent all inmates from being able to control any assets they have on the outside. This prevents them from committing further crimes, exerting influence, or running an enterprise (criminal or legal) while incarcerated.

            • MothmanDelorian@lemmy.world
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              24 hours ago

              Lawyers or anyone that has power of attorney can make payments on your behalf. How do you think people pay mortgages or make payments in jail?

                • MothmanDelorian@lemmy.world
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                  24 hours ago

                  I never said it was. I specified who can make payments for you while you are serving time. The fact you think this can’t happen or that the prison has any involvement in this is really off

                  edit: It should say Lawyers OR not ir perhaps that’s the confusion?

        • Rhoeri@lemmy.world
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          1 day ago

          Soooo…. Do you not know what lawyers and trusts are and what they do? If not, have an adult explain these things to you when you can, and if so….

          Why embarrass yourself wish such an ignorant comment?

  • Phoenicianpirate@lemm.ee
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    1 day ago

    He referred to the prosecutors as scum and said they were the ones who were persecuting him like it was some purely political shit when he is an incredibly prolific fraudsters, rapist, and traitor. He should have been arrested during the Jan 6th insurrection and never allowed free again.

    His reasoning was that Ross was a libertarian and this is to honor the libertarian movement that supported him… dude! He labeled the fucking drug cartels terrorist organizations and Ross enabled so much drug trafficking it isn’t funny. How the fuck do people not see through that?

    • explodicle@sh.itjust.works
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      21 hours ago

      Here’s my convoluted conspiracy theory for how this makes sense.

      • Trump launches Trump Coin

      • Trump pardons crypto drug dealer, but not paper drug dealers

      • Crypto market booms

      • Trump sells coin to whichever idiots he hasn’t scammed yet

        • explodicle@sh.itjust.works
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          6 hours ago

          You can already do that with any cryptocurrency using a mixer. And some of them already have strong privacy built in or available as add-ons.

      • VerifiedSource@sh.itjust.works
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        8 hours ago

        I also think this is some crypto bro shenanigans. Ulbricht might even have billions in Bitcoin stashed away somewhere for a juicy payback.

  • MunkysUnkEnz0@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    Probably made a deal and wants all his Bitcoin. Smart kid, you know it’s hidden somewhere. Thank God he’s out there double life without parole. It’s inhumane.

    Not to mention that undercover basically set him up to look bad.

    • paraphrand@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      People can watch his wallets right? And they suspect/know what ones they are? And this is something people are hotly following now?

      I should look this up. It’s fascinating if we can just watch it happen, on the chain.

      • nomy@lemmy.zip
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        1 day ago

        He was never charged or convicted of those charges, he’s innocent of that.

          • nomy@lemmy.zip
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            17 hours ago

            You’re right, I should’ve said never convicted. There’s a ton of conspiracies around it all, was he actually the first Dread Pirate Roberts or was it actually a title passed down? At the time everyone was saying parallel construction but in hindsight he was probably just sloppy. It was a really exciting time.

        • LengAwaits@lemmy.world
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          18 hours ago

          Well, you’re half correct. He was charged in Maryland for attempted witness murder, but the charges were dropped once he’d been sentenced so harshly in New York. The reasons for this are not entirely clear, and there’s plenty of conspiratorial debate about them.

          I strongly doubt that the prosecution would have brought the charges if they didn’t have traceable evidence (through blockchain transaction records, undercover police chat logs, and data seizure) that coins, sent to an undercover agent for the purposes of murder, originated from wallets that were owned by Ulbricht. You can read more about one of the employees Ulbricht allegedly tried to have murdered (Curtis Green, who was sentenced for his own crimes) here and here.

          You’re right, though, he’s technically innocent as the charges were dismissed. Perhaps it was all a huge setup/honeypot but the truth of whether or not he sent the coins should be discoverable with enough due diligence scouring the blockchain records. Intent matters, even though it didn’t end up getting tried in this instance.

    • jonne@infosec.pub
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      2 days ago

      Someone should really convince him to legalise all drugs to stick it to the cartels.

  • HappySkullsplitter@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    “The scum that worked to convict him were some of the same lunatics who were involved in the modern day weaponization of government against me.”

    He called Ulbricht’s prison sentence “ridiculous.”

    I clearly recall Trump being president from 2016-2020, Ulbricht was sentenced to life without parole in 2015.

    If it was so ridiculous, why didn’t he pardon him on his first term? What changed to make it such an immediate priority now?

    • Podunk@lemmy.world
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      Because he needed the libertarian vote this time in order to win. Its a very cheap promise that guarantees votes and doesnt alienate anyone that doesnt care. Honestly, the fact that he followed through suprises me.

      “But why didnt he need the libertarian vote in 16?”

      Because he never intended to win the first time. The first run was a fluke. He wanted to play victim and run the media circuit for profit.

    • jonne@infosec.pub
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      2 days ago

      Back then he thought Bitcoin was bad and a scam. This time someone showed him how to make money by creating a scam coin and doing a pump and dump, so now he’s pro Bitcoin. So pro he’ll get rid of all regulation so pump and dump scams are completely legal.

      • parody@lemmings.world
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        2 days ago

        Imagine how many times he was asked:

        “Why don’t you have your own “Bitcoin” coin yet, Mr. President?”

      • explodicle@sh.itjust.works
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        21 hours ago

        I bet Trump is still anti Bitcoin. Under the previous administration, the SEC applied the Howey Test to cryptocurrencies and would have identified Trump Coin as a security. Trump is only interested if he can be in charge of it.

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      21 hours ago

      Trump doesn’t need to think about re-election this time around so he has more political freedom.

  • then_three_more@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    Could someone explain like to an non American why the president gets to pardon people at all?

    If someone committed a crime they’re guilty, if there’s new evidence that they’re not guilty then that’s what appeals are for.

    • sudneo@lemm.ee
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      2 days ago

      Just FYI this is not just an American thing. In Italy for example the President of the republic can cancel or amend sentences too, and it does happen relatively often, although not in the same partisan way as in the US (but that’s also because the president in Italy is a neutral and representative position).

      Some example from few years ago when the president graced 33 people (each with a specific articulated motivation) https://www.ilpost.it/2021/12/10/mattarella-grazia-sette-persone-sebastian-oberleteir-heinrich/ (in Italian, but you can translate if you wish).

    • GBU_28@lemm.ee
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      2 days ago

      In a perfect system, the pardon is meant to be a “check” on the powers of the other branches. (Legislative and judicial). Each branch is meant to both support AND check the others.

      Obviously we are watching it all unwind. Certain things were a “gentleman’s agreement” in that a president normally wouldn’t over do it and just pardon tons of people. We are finding out lots of things were just assumed to be ok, but are easily abused by bad actors

      • then_three_more@lemmy.world
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        2 days ago

        That kinda makes sense, but aren’t some of your top judges appointed by the president. Which would mean the office of the president automatically has 2/3 of the things under their control.

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          Congress/Senate has to confirm judge appointments, but they mostly rubber stamp the appointments if the Senate is the same party as the president.

        • GBU_28@lemm.ee
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          21 hours ago

          Between Biden and trump we are in a new era.

          Similarly McConnell holding up supreme court nominee hearings for months, the way he did represents the erosion of another “gentleman’s agreement” between the branches of government.

    • atzanteol@sh.itjust.works
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      2 days ago

      My best understanding is that it was a historic right of kings, governors, etc. The idea was to show mercy to those who may have been convicted wrongly, or to people convicted of laws that have been overturned.

      Trump is abusing it in ways never done before to payback political supporters.

      TBF Biden abused it as well in pardoning his son.