DOJ investigates online posts about life sentence in Silk Road case that implied a threat to judge
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Did online commenters mean it when they implicitly threatened the federal judge who last month gave Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht a life sentence?
Or were the Reason.com posts simply trollish statements intended to get a rise out of readers?
In either case, the comments, which have since been removed, have gotten the attention of federal authorities. The Department of Justice is subpoenaing Reason.com for the identities of six individuals involved in a comment string that discussed shooting “judges like these,” after Ulbricht’s sentence, preferably on the courthouse steps, Wired reports.
If charged with mailing threatening communications to a federal judge and convicted of the felony, they could be looking at as much as 10 years in prison, the article notes.
Reason.com didn’t respond to a request by Wired for comment. However, Wired offered its own thoughts on the potential criminal case:
“It’s hard to imagine the Reason.com commenters actually intended violent action,” rather than “the typical trollish provocation that fills so many web comment sections,” the article says. “But that doesn’t make their speech any less illegal under existing statutes about threatening federal officials.”
Related coverage:
ABAJournal.com: “Claimed mastermind of Silk Road drug-sale website gets life without parole, is ordered to pay $183M”
See also:
ABAJournal.com: “Federal judge in $1.2B Silk Road drug case is threatened online”
