After Ross was arrested, the Silk Road Web site was promptly shut down. But it took only a few weeks before a new Silk Road 2.0 opened for business, with a new Dread Pirate Roberts at the helm of the ship. When that was subsequently shut down by the Feds, another Silk Road appeared, along with hundreds of other Web sites that anonymously sell drugs online. The people who run these Web sites see themselves as part of a movement, and some believe what they are doing is making the world a safer place. Maybe it’s just a justification; or maybe it’s not.
In 2015, the year that Ross was sentenced to life in prison, a group of university researchers concluded a 67,000-hour study that involved interviewing 100,000 people around the world about their drug use. One of the questions in the survey asked people how they got their drugs. With that data the researchers noted that the year after the Silk Road opened for business, as many as 20 percent of respondents started to purchase drugs online. When the researchers asked these people why they chose to buy drugs on the Internet and not on the street, the users explained that they were nearly six times more likely to be physically harmed on the street. Clearly Ross had fulfilled the goal that had led him to start the Silk Road, and tens of thousands of people feel safer being able to buy drugs online.
But as with all technologies, there is a good side and a bad. Also in 2015, another study was released. This one was by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which said that for the first time in recent history, more people had died from heroin-and opioid-related drug overdoses in America than from gun deaths. As news reports noted, sometimes accompanied by chilling videos taken from smartphones, in hundreds of incidents of overdoses, children are left orphaned. One of the reasons for the rise in deaths was due to the ease with which people could now gain access to synthetic opioids, like fentanyl, that are made in labs in China. These drugs are fifty to one hundred times stronger than traditional heroin and users often misjudge how much to inject, which inevitably leads to a fatal overdose. The charts the CDC released along with its report, illustrating the number of people who had died from these synthetic opioids, were not too dissimilar to those showing the profits and revenues from the Silk Road, with an abrupt line pointing upward and off to the right.
Often when news articles are written about studies related to online drug-buying, the stories mention Ross Ulbricht as the pioneer at the forefront of this new world. The links from the stories will eventually lead readers to an obscure video online that was recorded a few years earlier at the Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco. In the video Ross is talking to his old friend from high school, René, about their future outlook on life. The video is slightly out of focus, and while the two friends seem to be in the same conversation, it appears that Ross is talking about someone else.
“Do you think you’re going to live forever?” René asks.
There’s a brief contemplative pause, then Ross Ulbricht looks at the camera and answers, “I think it’s a possibility. I honestly do. I think I might live forever in some form.”
Chapter 73
THE OTHERS
A few days after the arrest of Ross, the FBI agents left San Francisco and flew back to New York City to begin corralling evidence and sifting through the Samsung laptop. Chris Tarbell believed that the drama was over, that they had caught the Dread Pirate Roberts.
He had returned to the office and into the Pit, when his phone rang. “Your shit is online,” Jared had roared into the receiver.
“What?” Tarbell responded, clueless. “What are you talking about?”
Jared explained that the online drug bazaar was in shambles. Their leader was gone, and the employees wanted revenge. Their target had become the name on the bottom of Ross Ulbricht’s arrest report: “Christopher Tarbell. Special Agent. The Federal Bureau of Investigation.”
When Tarbell looked at the link Jared sent, detailing what the lieutenants of DPR had posted online, he saw his home address, his kids’ school address, the home address of his in-laws, Sabrina’s parents, and a slew of messages about the need to get Tarbell and to destroy his family.
Tarbell immediately stumbled into a panic. He yelled to his coworkers, “They’re coming after my family!” and then frantically called his wife, Sabrina, saying their code word, “Quicksand! Quicksand!”
The FBI mobilized immediately. A central command in Washington, which specialized in protecting agents who were under threat, was deployed. The NYPD was notified, with squad cars en route to Tarbell’s house, the kids’ school, and the home of his in-laws. With sirens blaring, Tarbell and his family were whisked off to a hotel in New Jersey, where they would spend the long weekend hiding out.
Days later, when the FBI and NYPD said it was safe for the family to return home, they drove back the way they had come and into a house that was now being monitored via live video feeds and round-the-clock federal surveillance teams. That evening, after the kids had been tucked into bed and kissed good night, Tarbell and Sabrina sat across from each other at the kitchen table. They both had handguns next to them in case someone tried to enter the home. As they ate dinner, they looked like two people at war.
Something had changed over that weekend. Sabrina’s mothering instincts had been awakened by the risks that had brushed up against her children, and as she looked at her husband, she spoke about the perils lovingly and yet resolutely. “I’ve given you sixteen years of this life,” she said, “but maybe now it’s time for you to do something for your family.”
He knew exactly what she was asking for. His whole life, all Chris Tarbell had ever wanted to be was a cop. He didn’t care if he was handing out tickets to jaywalkers or hunting down the most wanted man on the Internet; it was his reason for being here. But at the same time he had always wanted a family too. And between the FBI and Sabrina and the kids, it wasn’t even a question of which one he was going to choose.
Tarbell handed in his gun and his badge; the Eliot Ness of cyberspace resigned from the FBI.
Tarbell now works for a major cyberconsultancy in New York City, where he assists companies and the government in computer-related crimes. He still plays the “would you rather” game. Even though his wife, Sabrina, now feels much safer, she still carries a handgun with her throughout the house, even resting one atop her fresh towels in the hamper while she does the laundry.
? ? ?