Operators Charged in $430M Dark Web Scheme

[TomPluz]

You can get more of this development here.

Two men accused of owning and operating a dark web marketplace that facilitated more than $430 million in transactions have been charged in federal court in Chicago.

Thomas Pavey, a 38-year-old resident of Ormond Beach, Florida, and Raheim Hamilton, a 28-year-old Suffolk, Virginia resident, are accused of operating “spam site em blocked,” a dark web marketplace that allowed users to buy and sell illegal goods and services around the world, according to a superseding indictment returned Thursday in U.S. District Court in Chicago.

The two men have been charged with drug trafficking, computer fraud, access device fraud, counterfeiting, and money laundering.

Prosecutors say Pavey, also known as “Dopenugget,” and Hamilton, also known as “Sydney” and “Zero Angel,” had allegedly worked together selling counterfeit U.S. currency on a dark web marketplace called “AlphaBay,” which was shut down in 2017. The two then owned and operated spam site em blocked from 2018 to 2020.

I am sure these two guys - Thomas Pavey and  Raheim Hamilton can be facing the same fate bestowed on Ross Ulbricht for his Silk Road the online black market and the first modern darknet market which started in 2011 and later shut down by the government in 2013. By the looks of things, I think these three men were doing the same business and the same strategy. Try as I want to be sympathetic to these two fellows, we should know that the use of cryptocurrency will never save anyone who is facilitating the trade of many illegal products on the darkweb. Eventually the arms of the law will reach anyone and the time for reckoning can be coming. I am just wondering...what do you think enticed these people to be involved in a business formula that they knew beforehand will surely land them in jail? That is aside from money...

[Baofeng]

Well what they did is illegal already, selling counterfeit money and other stuff, so that already constitute a jail time if they are caught. But the thing is that they uses the dark web to their advantage and might have thought that they are anonymous during that time.

And mostly there are a lot of individuals who have thrive on that marketplace for years, maybe some of them are still on the loose and had make a ton of money or many like in this case has been caught with their pseudo and put a name on it.

So another one bites the dust, so good riddance for them.

[TomPluz]

Well what they did is illegal already, selling counterfeit money and other stuff, so that already constitute a jail time if they are caught. But the thing is that they uses the dark web to their advantage and might have thought that they are anonymous during that time. And mostly there are a lot of individuals who have thrive on that marketplace for years, maybe some of them are still on the loose and had make a ton of money or many like in this case has been caught with their pseudo and put a name on it. So another one bites the dust, so good riddance for them.

And I am sure the dust tastes like a bitter medicine to hopefully cure them of their addiction to illegal things. I still could not understand why there are people who are so convinced that modern technologies including cryptocurrency, of course, can be able to hide them from being caught by the law. While I am against the disparaging use of lawfare, I am in favor of running after people like these two above and make them accountable for the damages they have done to the society. Sadly, this is not going to be the last case on this nature as years from now there can be another players that can be charged for the same ground. People who never learned from the lessons of others are really bound to suffer the same fate.

[yhiaali3]

Of course, this is the inevitable end for everyone who manipulates the law and does illegal things and believes that they will not be punished in the end. The main reason for all of this, I think, is greed and excessive self-confidence. These people think that they are so smart that they can survive without being detected, but they fall victim to their own arrogance in the end.

But I would like to clarify something, which is that not everyone who uses the dark web is necessarily outside the law. There are people who want to maintain the greatest amount of privacy, so they resort to dark web services.

[NotATether]

Lots of darknet drug marketplaces going down recently. So it looks like they are cracking down on them harder.

I wonder how do they manage to infiltrate all those darknet market sites or at least nab the administrator(s).

Anyways, it doesn't have much to do with cryptocurrency anyways. A darknet market was always going to use BTC or XMR.

[Zed0X]

Yeah, it would be interesting how those two (and their lawyers) will handle the case they are charged with. They might have to agree to a plea deal and cooperate to avoid the double life sentence that was handed down to Ross or the maximum is life as mentioned in the article.

[Faisal2202]

I am sure these two guys - Thomas Pavey and  Raheim Hamilton can be facing the same fate bestowed on Ross Ulbricht for his Silk Road the online black market and the first modern darknet market which started in 2011 and later shut down by the government in 2013. By the looks of things, I think these three men were doing the same business and the same strategy. Try as I want to be sympathetic to these two fellows, we should know that the use of cryptocurrency will never save anyone who is facilitating the trade of many illegal products on the darkweb. Eventually the arms of the law will reach anyone and the time for reckoning can be coming. I am just wondering...what do you think enticed these people to be involved in a business formula that they knew beforehand will surely land them in jail? That is aside from money...

Maybe they are just clowns in the game (no offense) but maybe there are higher people who hired these two dudes to do the work for them, just like in any movie. I know it's fictional but not impossible. This can be a possibility but if they were active till 2020 only and are being caught now, it means authorities were keeping an eye on these dudes and were waiting for some mistake that they would make and lead them to these dudes.

Comparing these 2 dudes to the owner of SilkRoad is quite creative. Because I thought Ross was not involved in any kind of dealing, plus his exchange's main motive was to provide anonymous selling and buying, but not to provide a haven for scammers or bad actors. Although it worked as a haven for scammers. But in terms of these 2 dudes, their main aim was to provide such a marketplace, as they were on the darknet, and they knew bad things were being traded and they did it on purpose.

Considering the crime, I think these 2 would be given the same punishment as they gave to Ross, if not then supporters of Ross will raise voices not against these 2 dudes but for the support of Ross.

[Captain Corporate]

To be fair, they knew that what they were doing was illegal, and they did it anyway. It doesn't matter if their defense is "but who did they hurt, they just offered a platform, what people used that platform for is not their job" and so forth, they could try their very best and do whatever they want and try any kind of result to that, but we all know that it is not going to work. It is illegal to have a platform where you can offer illegal stuff, and they made that dark net website knowing full well that if they are ever caught, they are going to spend a serious time in jail, they saw what happened to Ulbricht, and they still did it. So they can't be all too shocked about this outcome.