It is said that crime does not pay. This saying has never been more relevant than in the controversies surrounding the now-infamous Silk Road. The fallout investigation has just netted another criminal: a secret service agent who worked on the case.
Shaun Bridges is a former US Secret Service agent who pleaded guilty to money laundering and obstruction of justice for his involvement in the skimming of BTC (Bitcoin) from Silk Road drug dealers and customers. He will remain behind bars for 71 months.
Bridges found himself in the Silk Road marketplace to first gain intel. This intel would be used to help bring down the drug trading marketplace. Silk Road had become famous for the anonymity provided by the Deep Web.
Eventually, he used administration credentials from a confidential informant and posed as an admin of the Silk Road. Using this modus, he was able to amass 20,000 BTC, The Next Web reported.
Part of Bridges' sentence is the payment of $500,000. The stolen Bitcoin, depending on when it was converted to US Dollars, can be as high as $22.5 million. The current value of 20,000 BTC is $7.8 million.
Shaun Bridges' case is at the end of a long and controversial investigation that ran parallel with Silk Road mastermind Ross Ulbricht. He is also the second government agent to be convicted for enriching himself while running the Silk Road case.
His alleged partner-in-crime, DEA agent Carl Mark Force, was convicted in July. He pleaded guilty to charges of extortion, money laundering, and obstruction of justice. He was sentenced to six years in prison last October, The Verge reported.
At the moment, it is still unclear how center Bridges and Force were to the Silk Road case. However, the charges to both agents were not made public until after Ulbricht was convicted. Silk Road big boss Ross Ulbricht got two life sentences in May.
