The United States President Donald Trump pardoned Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht, who had been sentenced to life in prison in 2015 for owning and operating the dark web online marketplace Silk Road.
According to federal Bureau of Prisons records, Ulbricht walked free from prison in Arizona following Trump’s announcement.
The Trump administration is expected to significantly reverse the regulatory crackdown on the cryptocurrency sector that occurred during former Democratic President Joe Biden’s tenure. In May, Trump announced plans to commute Ross Ulbricht’s sentence during a speech at the Libertarian National Convention. The Libertarian Party, which advocates for drug legalization, has pushed for Ulbricht’s release, citing the case as an example of government overreach.
Prosecutors described Ulbricht’s arrest as the end of a global black-market bazaar. Starting in 2011, more than 100,000 people used Silk Road over two years to buy and sell USD$214 million worth of illegal drugs and other illicit services. Prosecutors linked some drug-related deaths to purchases made on the site.
The Silk Road relied on the Tor network for anonymous communication and accepted bitcoin as payment. Prosecutors said this helped users conceal their identities and locations. They also claimed Ulbricht operated the marketplace under the alias Dread Pirate Roberts, a reference to a character in the 1987 movie The Princess Bride.
According to prosecutors, he took extreme measures to protect Silk Road’s operation. This included soliciting the murders of individuals who posed a threat. However, they also acknowledged finding no evidence that any murders were carried out.
Ross Ulbricht – Silk Road creator – is free thanks to the pardon from President Trump 🇺🇸
The most beautiful thing, aside from the wings of freedom, is the little plant 🍃 he’s holding—presumably from prison
A symbol of resilience and growth
Truly moving 💚 pic.twitter.com/oxBegQFinG
— Mambo Italiano (@mamboitaliano__) January 22, 2025
Read more: President Trump and First Lady launch matching crypto
Read more: Bitcoin enthusiasm rides high as Trump prepares to take presidential office
Two life sentences for operating a dark web marketplace
Ulbricht admitted to creating Silk Road but not much else.
During the trial, a defense lawyer argued that he intended it as a “freewheeling, free market site” but later handed it off to others. They claimed the true operators lured him back toward the end to use him as the “fall guy.”
In February 2015, a federal jury in Manhattan convicted him of distributing drugs over the internet and conspiring to commit computer hacking and money laundering.
“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,” Trump said in a post on his social media platform Truth Social.
Ulbricht, born in 1984 in Austin, Texas, earned a degree in physics from the University of Texas at Dallas. He later pursued graduate studies in material science at Penn State University. Disillusioned with traditional societal structures, Ulbricht embraced libertarian philosophies, which strongly influenced his creation of the Silk Road. He envisioned the platform as a means to promote personal freedom and resist government overreach.
The Silk Road quickly gained notoriety, with transactions totaling millions of dollars in Bitcoin. Its success drew the attention of law enforcement agencies worldwide. After an intensive investigation, Ulbricht was arrested in October 2013 at a San Francisco library. Authorities seized the Silk Road servers and substantial amounts of Bitcoin.
In 2015, Ulbricht was convicted on charges including money laundering, computer hacking, conspiracy to traffic narcotics, and continuing a criminal enterprise. He received a double life sentence plus 40 years without the possibility of parole. Critics argue his sentence argue was excessively harsh, given that Ulbricht was not directly implicated in any violent crime.
