1 00:00:08,800 --> 00:00:10,927 Welcome to Darknet Demystified. 2 00:00:10,927 --> 00:00:12,345 My name is Sam Ben. 3 00:00:12,345 --> 00:00:16,516 Former Darknet Vendor Market Admin content creator, 4 00:00:16,558 --> 00:00:19,060 author, hacker and paralegal. 5 00:00:20,353 --> 00:00:23,565 On this show, I'll dive into topics related to the Darknet. 6 00:00:24,858 --> 00:00:27,527 Today's episode is about a famous Darknet 7 00:00:27,527 --> 00:00:30,113 vendor selling only one product. 8 00:00:31,448 --> 00:00:35,410 I'm personally kind of excited and intrigued where this specific vendor 9 00:00:35,410 --> 00:00:39,789 still at the same time, I was kind of disappointed by 10 00:00:39,831 --> 00:00:42,083 some of the things that I had learned about him, 11 00:00:42,083 --> 00:00:45,962 including some of the deceptive practices that he had practiced 12 00:00:46,212 --> 00:00:50,759 regarding his product and ultimately his poor OPSEC. 13 00:00:51,968 --> 00:00:55,096 His online name was TripWithScience. 14 00:00:55,096 --> 00:00:59,059 And in real life he went by James Verl Barlow 15 00:01:00,393 --> 00:01:04,147 despite not being active on the Darknet forums. 16 00:01:04,230 --> 00:01:08,234 James has built an empire around one particular drug. 17 00:01:09,402 --> 00:01:11,988 Psychedelic mushrooms. 18 00:01:11,988 --> 00:01:14,949 This is extremely impressive 19 00:01:15,075 --> 00:01:17,994 when you consider that people getting high 20 00:01:18,036 --> 00:01:21,873 by eating mushrooms is not something that happens daily. 21 00:01:22,082 --> 00:01:25,126 So many drugs like cocaine, 22 00:01:25,126 --> 00:01:28,088 heroin, cannabis pills, for example. 23 00:01:28,505 --> 00:01:32,592 Typically the things that users will consume on a daily basis. 24 00:01:32,801 --> 00:01:36,137 So when you're looking to become Darknet vendor, 25 00:01:36,971 --> 00:01:40,058 setting up your goals of how much you want to sell 26 00:01:40,058 --> 00:01:43,186 and what you want to sell should kind of be based on that. 27 00:01:43,770 --> 00:01:47,065 People who are going to ingest things like cocaine, heroin, cannabis, 28 00:01:47,065 --> 00:01:52,028 and sometimes pharmaceuticals are going to be doing that on a pretty regular basis, 29 00:01:52,737 --> 00:01:55,365 whereas an individual who's taking mushrooms, 30 00:01:55,365 --> 00:01:58,409 I only do it once or five times in their life or ever. 31 00:01:58,451 --> 00:01:59,285 You never really know 32 00:02:00,578 --> 00:02:01,788 if you're selling something. 33 00:02:01,788 --> 00:02:04,541 You want to people to consumer regularly. 34 00:02:04,958 --> 00:02:09,045 It means more sales for you, which means more money more individuals consume. 35 00:02:09,254 --> 00:02:12,173 The better it is for you as a drug trafficker. 36 00:02:12,173 --> 00:02:14,551 I remember when I was a Darknet vendor 37 00:02:14,551 --> 00:02:19,514 seeing TripWithScience sell and seeing him only sell psychedelics 38 00:02:20,140 --> 00:02:22,475 then specifically as quote unquote 39 00:02:22,809 --> 00:02:24,727 liquid mushrooms. 40 00:02:25,812 --> 00:02:28,064 Not only did he restrict his business model 41 00:02:28,064 --> 00:02:31,901 specifically to psychedelics and only mushrooms 42 00:02:31,901 --> 00:02:36,281 inside of the psychedelic category, or so he advertised again, 43 00:02:37,198 --> 00:02:39,367 but he further defined himself 44 00:02:39,367 --> 00:02:42,745 in that specific category. 45 00:02:42,745 --> 00:02:46,749 In a recent YouTube video, I talk about making Green Dragon 46 00:02:46,749 --> 00:02:51,671 and Gray Dragon, I explained the process of how to go about making these things. 47 00:02:51,671 --> 00:02:54,048 Specifically, it's called the tincture. 48 00:02:54,924 --> 00:02:57,260 To create a tincture, an individual would get 49 00:02:58,136 --> 00:03:00,763 psychedelic mushrooms by either growing them 50 00:03:00,763 --> 00:03:04,184 or buying them if they grew them, they would dry them out. 51 00:03:04,225 --> 00:03:08,521 After drying them out, you would grind them up into a fine powder 52 00:03:08,521 --> 00:03:10,648 and after grinding them up into a fine powder, 53 00:03:10,648 --> 00:03:13,693 you would soak them in alcohol for a few weeks. 54 00:03:13,693 --> 00:03:17,530 Then you'd filter out the ground of mushrooms with some cheesecloth. 55 00:03:17,989 --> 00:03:20,158 And this is what they called Gray dragon. 56 00:03:20,158 --> 00:03:23,036 And essentially you have the extract of the chemical 57 00:03:23,119 --> 00:03:26,331 that makes you hallucinate into the alcohol. 58 00:03:28,041 --> 00:03:31,544 Ingesting mushrooms this way allows you to avoid having stomach ache 59 00:03:31,544 --> 00:03:34,839 because all you get is the chemical that makes you hallucinate 60 00:03:35,340 --> 00:03:39,177 instead of the actual psychedelic mushroom itself, 61 00:03:39,177 --> 00:03:43,306 which causes like really bad stomach aches and your body wants to reject it 62 00:03:43,640 --> 00:03:46,601 because it's a poisonous mushroom essentially. 63 00:03:46,601 --> 00:03:49,812 It also works faster and has been known to offer 64 00:03:49,812 --> 00:03:53,691 more of a quote unquote clean trip. 65 00:03:53,691 --> 00:03:56,819 That's said TripWithScience Didn't do this. 66 00:03:57,070 --> 00:03:57,737 And he didn't. 67 00:03:57,737 --> 00:04:01,491 So mushrooms that had been processed this way. 68 00:04:01,532 --> 00:04:03,701 Instead, he sold what's called an analog. 69 00:04:04,160 --> 00:04:08,289 So while he advertised that he sold liquid mushrooms, 70 00:04:08,957 --> 00:04:12,794 he didn't an analog for those of you 71 00:04:12,794 --> 00:04:15,880 who don't know what it is, refers to a substance 72 00:04:16,756 --> 00:04:19,759 which chemically is similar to another drug 73 00:04:20,009 --> 00:04:23,763 like it might have a similar effect to that original drug, 74 00:04:23,763 --> 00:04:26,975 but it's slightly different and is similar to a structure 75 00:04:27,642 --> 00:04:30,478 can change how it interacts with the body. 76 00:04:30,853 --> 00:04:34,482 Analogs are often developed to avoid legal restrictions 77 00:04:34,482 --> 00:04:36,859 placed on different controlled substances. 78 00:04:37,735 --> 00:04:41,823 To put it simply, an analog is a similar version of a drug 79 00:04:41,823 --> 00:04:44,117 that has been modified in some way. 80 00:04:45,827 --> 00:04:46,786 This is in stark 81 00:04:46,786 --> 00:04:50,623 contrast to what he had claimed for almost a decade, 82 00:04:50,623 --> 00:04:53,793 which he had said in almost every single one 83 00:04:53,793 --> 00:04:57,297 of his profile posts that he had had up 84 00:04:58,089 --> 00:05:03,386 where he had said outright, quote, Liquid mushrooms 85 00:05:03,386 --> 00:05:06,764 are simply the psychoactive element of the Psilocybe Cubensis. 86 00:05:06,764 --> 00:05:09,642 These mushrooms sort of Psilocybin even, 87 00:05:09,642 --> 00:05:12,895 but extract it in its pure form, separated 88 00:05:13,313 --> 00:05:18,192 from all the fungal materials, spore spores, a fungal defense mechanism 89 00:05:18,192 --> 00:05:22,155 that Mother Nature evolved to cause nausea in mammals like you 90 00:05:22,572 --> 00:05:25,033 so that their spores can survive 91 00:05:25,950 --> 00:05:27,952 a mammalian digestive tract. 92 00:05:29,495 --> 00:05:32,874 Each ten milliliter vial contains nine milligrams of Psilocybin 93 00:05:32,874 --> 00:05:36,878 seven equivalent to two grams of dried mushrooms. 94 00:05:36,878 --> 00:05:40,214 So one vial contains enough Psilocybin for fun. 95 00:05:40,214 --> 00:05:42,425 A solid trip with plenty of visuals. 96 00:05:42,425 --> 00:05:46,095 If you're a lightweight under 130LBS, you might only need three fourths 97 00:05:46,095 --> 00:05:47,889 of a vial, unquote. 98 00:05:49,390 --> 00:05:50,558 To me 99 00:05:50,600 --> 00:05:55,271 as a Darknet vendor, to see games operating for all this time with 100 00:05:55,813 --> 00:05:59,442 one drug exclusively, that was pretty exciting to me 101 00:05:59,442 --> 00:06:01,903 to see that it could be successful with just one drug. 102 00:06:01,944 --> 00:06:05,198 It was disappointing, though, to learn that he had basically 103 00:06:05,198 --> 00:06:08,326 lied to his customers for almost a decade. 104 00:06:09,327 --> 00:06:12,538 To me, telling them it's one thing and it's really 105 00:06:12,538 --> 00:06:15,583 something else is tantamount to poisoning someone 106 00:06:15,583 --> 00:06:18,753 on almost every darknet market that he was on. 107 00:06:18,753 --> 00:06:21,255 This description was on his profile page. 108 00:06:22,715 --> 00:06:25,176 There's no real need to lie to begin with. 109 00:06:25,468 --> 00:06:26,594 They don't tell people. 110 00:06:26,594 --> 00:06:29,430 It's one thing when it's something else. 111 00:06:30,056 --> 00:06:33,267 As far as I know, James holds the crown for being the dark 112 00:06:33,267 --> 00:06:36,187 net's longest living vendor. 113 00:06:36,187 --> 00:06:38,481 However, being the world's best darknet 114 00:06:38,481 --> 00:06:41,484 vendor is a lot like being the world's best hacker. 115 00:06:42,026 --> 00:06:45,530 I'm sure at the end of the day, there's someone out there who's been in Darknet 116 00:06:45,530 --> 00:06:48,825 Vendor for longer or is better at it. 117 00:06:48,825 --> 00:06:51,911 And I say this because at the end of the day, the best 118 00:06:51,911 --> 00:06:55,748 Darknet vendor or the best hacker in the world 119 00:06:56,165 --> 00:06:59,460 is one that nobody knows and we never will, 120 00:07:00,044 --> 00:07:02,630 because that individual, whether it's a man or woman, like 121 00:07:03,339 --> 00:07:05,133 they're going to be a ghost. 122 00:07:05,133 --> 00:07:06,426 And that's what makes them the best. 123 00:07:06,426 --> 00:07:07,844 We will never know who they are. 124 00:07:09,512 --> 00:07:10,221 James 125 00:07:10,221 --> 00:07:13,266 was an Army vet, a career veteran, at that. 126 00:07:13,391 --> 00:07:16,727 He spent 20 to 25 years in the United States Army. 127 00:07:17,186 --> 00:07:20,022 It's different accounts of the amount of time that he actually spent in there, 128 00:07:20,606 --> 00:07:21,607 but he's no joke. 129 00:07:21,607 --> 00:07:27,280 He's been awarded the Army Commendation Medal, the Army Achievement Medal, 130 00:07:27,280 --> 00:07:31,075 the National Defense Service Medal with a Bronze Star. 131 00:07:31,492 --> 00:07:34,871 Global War on Terrorism, Army Service, Ribbon 132 00:07:35,204 --> 00:07:37,957 Overseas, Servicewoman Army 133 00:07:37,957 --> 00:07:41,502 Reserve Award, Afghanistan Campaign Medal. 134 00:07:41,836 --> 00:07:46,340 The award for operations relating to the former Yugoslavia 135 00:07:46,966 --> 00:07:50,386 and Component Overseas Training Ribbon. 136 00:07:50,386 --> 00:07:56,434 NATO's Medal and Marksmanship Medal for being a sharpshooter with the rifle. 137 00:07:57,018 --> 00:08:00,438 I don't know what a lot of those are, but it sounds like a lot of medals. 138 00:08:00,480 --> 00:08:04,066 The United States attorney, as they always do, had estimated 139 00:08:04,066 --> 00:08:08,529 that James had made a small fortune selling his liquid mushrooms 140 00:08:09,363 --> 00:08:12,909 over more than 140 million in Bitcoin. 141 00:08:13,993 --> 00:08:16,537 James is a Las Vegas resident 142 00:08:16,537 --> 00:08:20,291 and had about 12 to $15 million in assets 143 00:08:20,333 --> 00:08:23,377 expensive property, luxury cars, jet 144 00:08:23,377 --> 00:08:25,755 skis, mountains of crypto 145 00:08:26,422 --> 00:08:29,592 in addition to a few loaded banks 146 00:08:29,759 --> 00:08:32,386 that had a ton of fiat currency in them. 147 00:08:33,679 --> 00:08:36,224 He was the head of the DTO. 148 00:08:36,224 --> 00:08:38,476 When you hear this kind of terminology, 149 00:08:38,726 --> 00:08:41,646 all it means is a drug trafficking organization. 150 00:08:41,896 --> 00:08:46,484 So when I say something like he was thought to be the head of the DTO, 151 00:08:46,651 --> 00:08:49,946 it means he was thought to be the head of the drug trafficking organization. 152 00:08:50,446 --> 00:08:53,616 While everyone thinks it's great to be the boss and like 153 00:08:53,991 --> 00:08:56,911 you know, being a drug trafficking organization, be the leader, 154 00:08:58,204 --> 00:09:00,831 the federal government would strongly disagree. 155 00:09:01,666 --> 00:09:04,544 This is reflected in their sentencing guidelines. 156 00:09:04,835 --> 00:09:10,132 Furthermore, when you're actually in federal prison, you often face a stigma, 157 00:09:11,092 --> 00:09:12,343 sometimes depending on 158 00:09:12,343 --> 00:09:15,972 the place you're at from staff for your case manager. 159 00:09:16,055 --> 00:09:18,641 Because of this label, 160 00:09:18,641 --> 00:09:20,768 I always tell people in federal prison 161 00:09:20,768 --> 00:09:24,313 that I'd rather be a leader and follower. 162 00:09:24,939 --> 00:09:27,733 It's not just an extra thing 163 00:09:27,733 --> 00:09:31,946 in sentencing and something that goes on your record and all that, 164 00:09:32,613 --> 00:09:36,367 but it literally increases the amount of time you actually get 165 00:09:36,367 --> 00:09:39,912 and possibly increases the security level that you'll have. 166 00:09:40,413 --> 00:09:42,498 So it screws you in a bunch of different ways. 167 00:09:43,374 --> 00:09:45,751 For example, there are a lot of programs that exist 168 00:09:46,210 --> 00:09:50,006 not only in the BOP or the federal prison system like the Bureau of Prisons, 169 00:09:50,006 --> 00:09:54,677 but in addition, in some cases, being a leader, manager, 170 00:09:55,011 --> 00:10:00,182 like leader slash manager of a DTO can disqualify you from various things 171 00:10:00,433 --> 00:10:05,229 under some of the criminal reform laws that exist like the First Step Act. 172 00:10:05,229 --> 00:10:07,898 And I'm not going to get into all that, don't worry. 173 00:10:07,898 --> 00:10:10,234 But that said, James, 174 00:10:10,276 --> 00:10:13,362 being the head of the DTO, he was 175 00:10:13,362 --> 00:10:16,574 the one that is going to get the most time unless you tell telling someone. 176 00:10:17,533 --> 00:10:20,453 And the DTO whose name was true was TripWithScience 177 00:10:20,494 --> 00:10:24,832 So when I refer to DTO, now you understand what I'm talking about, despite 178 00:10:25,291 --> 00:10:28,628 like what many people think, at the end of the day being a drug trafficker, 179 00:10:28,628 --> 00:10:33,591 primarily working on a national scale or an international scale. 180 00:10:33,758 --> 00:10:36,427 And doing so completely solo 181 00:10:37,136 --> 00:10:39,930 is difficult to impossible. 182 00:10:39,930 --> 00:10:42,725 And I would say for those who don't think it is, 183 00:10:42,725 --> 00:10:45,811 you try running any business on a but 184 00:10:45,895 --> 00:10:49,774 on an international level for a prolonged period of time, completely alone. 185 00:10:49,857 --> 00:10:52,443 It's extremely difficult to do. 186 00:10:52,443 --> 00:10:55,863 For this reason, James, you know, had to have a coconspirator 187 00:10:56,656 --> 00:10:59,575 in his case, many coconspirators. 188 00:11:00,868 --> 00:11:05,039 I was a really big OPSEC thing for me that got me really nervous. 189 00:11:05,039 --> 00:11:09,085 So I kept to just one coconspirator, which didn't obviously 190 00:11:09,085 --> 00:11:10,127 didn't work out too well, but 191 00:11:12,004 --> 00:11:14,590 unlike myself, James had multiple coconspirators, 192 00:11:14,924 --> 00:11:18,427 one of whom was his brother, who was 35 years old. 193 00:11:18,427 --> 00:11:21,305 His brother's name is Matt or Matthew. 194 00:11:22,014 --> 00:11:24,433 The drug that James actually sold, 195 00:11:25,518 --> 00:11:26,811 the drug that he actually sold. 196 00:11:26,811 --> 00:11:29,230 And bear with me, because pronouncing this is going to be ridiculous 197 00:11:29,605 --> 00:11:35,403 is 4-Hydroxy--N,N-Dimethyltryptaninte (4-AcO-DMT) I totally butchered 198 00:11:36,904 --> 00:11:38,406 I have no doubt 199 00:11:38,406 --> 00:11:41,951 that I butchered that pronunciation like totally and completely. 200 00:11:42,159 --> 00:11:46,497 So from now on, we're just going to call it 4-AcO-DMT. 201 00:11:47,957 --> 00:11:50,418 And I want to point out that from my understanding 202 00:11:50,918 --> 00:11:53,254 4-AcO-DMT 203 00:11:53,838 --> 00:11:58,634 is definitely not the same as Psilocybin Psilocybin is a naturally occurring 204 00:11:58,634 --> 00:12:02,263 psychedelic compound that is found in certain species of mushrooms. 205 00:12:02,263 --> 00:12:06,058 While 4-AcO-DMT is a synthetic 206 00:12:06,058 --> 00:12:11,647 analog of Psilocybin, that is sometimes used as a recreational drug, 207 00:12:12,314 --> 00:12:16,360 they do call it liquid shrooms, but it's an oxymoron. 208 00:12:16,902 --> 00:12:19,447 It's like if you get those those 209 00:12:19,447 --> 00:12:22,950 really cheap instant potatoes, like the Idaho potatoes, I think they're 210 00:12:24,827 --> 00:12:25,786 I think that's what they're called. 211 00:12:25,786 --> 00:12:30,458 When you look on the box, it says on the box real potatoes. 212 00:12:30,458 --> 00:12:31,208 Right. 213 00:12:31,208 --> 00:12:34,754 But if you look at the end of the word, potato 214 00:12:34,754 --> 00:12:38,382 O's closely, you'll see a TMS sign 215 00:12:39,759 --> 00:12:43,512 indicating that the real potatoes, quote unquote, 216 00:12:43,763 --> 00:12:47,349 is not actually them saying that they are using 217 00:12:47,349 --> 00:12:51,645 just real potatoes in their mashed potato flakes, 218 00:12:51,645 --> 00:12:57,067 but rather it's them showing a trademark symbol that they own. 219 00:12:58,027 --> 00:13:00,613 It's super deceptive, in my opinion. 220 00:13:00,613 --> 00:13:04,992 And it leads you to think that what you're consuming are, quote unquote, 221 00:13:04,992 --> 00:13:08,078 real potatoes rather than the trademark symbol 222 00:13:08,078 --> 00:13:11,499 of real potatoes. 223 00:13:11,707 --> 00:13:15,211 I mean, perhaps some of what you're consuming is real potatoes. 224 00:13:15,252 --> 00:13:18,255 I'm just saying that, like the lack of truth in advertising 225 00:13:18,255 --> 00:13:21,675 is prevalent in this case, just as it is some other places 226 00:13:22,426 --> 00:13:27,223 people call 4-AcO-DMT, quote unquote, liquid mushrooms 227 00:13:27,223 --> 00:13:30,309 because it can be consumed 228 00:13:30,309 --> 00:13:33,145 in liquid form as opposed to eating a mushroom. 229 00:13:33,437 --> 00:13:37,149 But despite the similar effects 4-AcO-DMT 230 00:13:37,274 --> 00:13:40,027 is not derived directly from mushrooms 231 00:13:40,694 --> 00:13:43,864 and it is a chemically distinct substance. 232 00:13:43,864 --> 00:13:46,367 And that's why at the end of the day it's an analog. 233 00:13:46,367 --> 00:13:51,205 So marketing them as liquid mushrooms and allowed him to stand out 234 00:13:51,455 --> 00:13:55,334 with the unique product in the darkness instead of just selling regular mushrooms. 235 00:13:55,334 --> 00:13:55,960 Right. 236 00:13:55,960 --> 00:14:00,297 And the Department of Justice claimed that an additional coconspirator, 237 00:14:00,297 --> 00:14:05,010 a guy named Ronald Brust, also had a hand in the operation. 238 00:14:05,803 --> 00:14:08,347 Then once Matthew, along with another 239 00:14:08,347 --> 00:14:13,310 coconspirator, had made the liquid mixture and they would ship them out 240 00:14:13,310 --> 00:14:18,983 to Tennessee in bulk or the UK for further packaging into vials. 241 00:14:18,983 --> 00:14:21,819 The product they sold typically was that nine mm 242 00:14:22,111 --> 00:14:25,072 milligram vial for $20 each. 243 00:14:25,656 --> 00:14:30,160 They sold this from many different darknet markets, including 244 00:14:30,411 --> 00:14:32,913 Silk Road 2.0 and Empire Market, 245 00:14:33,497 --> 00:14:36,000 like a few other Darknet vendors. 246 00:14:36,041 --> 00:14:38,669 TripWithScience employed shill accounts, 247 00:14:39,712 --> 00:14:42,882 so for those who don't know, she'll look out more or less 248 00:14:42,882 --> 00:14:46,802 when you're talking about in terms of like Darknet vendors as when they 249 00:14:47,970 --> 00:14:49,847 create or have created 250 00:14:49,847 --> 00:14:55,060 a fake username and password on multiple sites, effectively 251 00:14:55,060 --> 00:14:59,148 creating this fake identity of sorts in the dark. 252 00:14:59,148 --> 00:15:03,611 Now and establishing that name on these different sites and generating 253 00:15:03,611 --> 00:15:07,364 unique PGP keys for this and to make it just seem more legitimate, 254 00:15:08,157 --> 00:15:11,577 they would in effect send themselves money in exchange for drugs. 255 00:15:11,577 --> 00:15:13,329 So they'll have on to these darknet markets 256 00:15:13,329 --> 00:15:16,290 and they will buy their own drugs from themselves. 257 00:15:16,332 --> 00:15:20,586 In reality, of course, they're not like actually shipping the drugs to themselves. 258 00:15:20,586 --> 00:15:23,923 But what this does do is it counts as a sale 259 00:15:24,423 --> 00:15:28,177 and because of that sale, the shill account can now write a review 260 00:15:28,594 --> 00:15:32,348 for that darknet vendor, which the account is the Darknet vendor. 261 00:15:32,556 --> 00:15:34,516 This is something that I just I didn't 262 00:15:34,516 --> 00:15:37,937 I didn't have the time for this kind of crap when I was Darknet vendor and, 263 00:15:38,187 --> 00:15:40,689 and like I was going to outsource it because it's just 264 00:15:41,732 --> 00:15:43,359 not a good thing to get out there. 265 00:15:43,359 --> 00:15:46,946 You're having fake reviews done, but in turn, the Darknet 266 00:15:46,946 --> 00:15:51,617 vendor has more reviews and they look more reputable. 267 00:15:51,659 --> 00:15:54,954 This does have a cost to the Darknet vendor, though 268 00:15:55,746 --> 00:15:58,832 most of the time a small percentage of anywhere 269 00:15:58,832 --> 00:16:03,754 between like one and 5% of the sale price 270 00:16:03,754 --> 00:16:09,385 when a drug is sold on a darknet market goes to that darknet market, 271 00:16:09,385 --> 00:16:14,348 and this is their profit margin for facilitating that sale to begin with. 272 00:16:15,140 --> 00:16:18,185 So even when a vendor buys a product from himself, 273 00:16:18,185 --> 00:16:22,773 he will still have to pay this tribute or percentage to the Darknet market, 274 00:16:22,773 --> 00:16:28,946 and it'll be something that is automatically taken out of the sale cost. 275 00:16:28,946 --> 00:16:32,491 The percentage paid doesn't really amount to much. 276 00:16:32,491 --> 00:16:36,537 I mean, especially like we're talking about $20 vials here. So 277 00:16:37,788 --> 00:16:39,289 when doing this though, now 278 00:16:39,289 --> 00:16:43,877 you have like legitimate sales on a marketplace and in turn 279 00:16:44,378 --> 00:16:47,548 you would make reviews on a sale like Dread 280 00:16:47,548 --> 00:16:52,302 or another Darknet Market farm, and this would be like 281 00:16:52,302 --> 00:16:58,434 a de facto form of promotion that is verifiable. 282 00:16:58,434 --> 00:17:01,603 You could identify yourself as an individual on the darknet 283 00:17:01,603 --> 00:17:05,315 because you have an individual PKI, you have separate sales. 284 00:17:06,191 --> 00:17:09,445 So it looks like you're a legitimate real buyer. 285 00:17:09,528 --> 00:17:13,782 In addition to that, you can also, if you want, you slam your competition. 286 00:17:13,782 --> 00:17:18,620 Unfortunately, like this, deceptive practices practice by a few Darknet 287 00:17:18,620 --> 00:17:19,246 vendors. 288 00:17:19,246 --> 00:17:22,958 So TripWithScience was able to operate for almost a decade. 289 00:17:23,584 --> 00:17:26,378 As I said earlier, is one of the longest running darknet 290 00:17:26,378 --> 00:17:29,214 vendors that's currently known, that's been busted. 291 00:17:29,923 --> 00:17:33,093 A ton of Darknet vendors create new identities 292 00:17:33,093 --> 00:17:37,473 periodically and air traffic, lots of air in different drugs. 293 00:17:37,473 --> 00:17:41,852 So there are definitely Darknet vendors that are out there 294 00:17:41,852 --> 00:17:46,482 that are far superior to him in operational security skills 295 00:17:47,524 --> 00:17:49,276 and far superior to myself. 296 00:17:49,276 --> 00:17:53,447 That said, I do respect James as a bigger a fellow hustler and a Darknet vendor. 297 00:17:53,447 --> 00:17:56,325 I mean, the guy who ran it for almost ten years, 298 00:17:56,909 --> 00:18:00,120 like I personally don't think I would have wanted to deal with 299 00:18:00,120 --> 00:18:03,916 the stress that comes along with this stuff for that long. 300 00:18:04,124 --> 00:18:07,252 Going through some of the court documentation 301 00:18:07,252 --> 00:18:12,216 and reviewing some of the information about him to make this podcast episode. 302 00:18:12,549 --> 00:18:16,470 I was definitely disappointed, though, in the information that I found 303 00:18:16,970 --> 00:18:22,518 regarding like some of his decisions and dedication to operational security. 304 00:18:22,518 --> 00:18:26,188 And I'll give you some specific examples of what I mean by this, 305 00:18:26,188 --> 00:18:31,151 because I think it's necessary, given how long James was able to operate. 306 00:18:31,151 --> 00:18:33,362 Is DTO 307 00:18:34,279 --> 00:18:36,115 during the investigation, 308 00:18:36,115 --> 00:18:38,575 the feds looked at James as a Google drive, 309 00:18:38,951 --> 00:18:42,037 and it should be evident that as a Darknet vendor, 310 00:18:42,287 --> 00:18:46,625 nothing you do on the darknet should be anywhere 311 00:18:46,625 --> 00:18:50,712 near the clear net in any shape 312 00:18:50,712 --> 00:18:53,715 or form whatsoever. 313 00:18:53,715 --> 00:18:56,844 Like, as a matter of fact, there should be a barrier 314 00:18:57,094 --> 00:19:01,181 that should be erected that's like impossible to cross. 315 00:19:02,015 --> 00:19:05,310 I say that because at the end of the day, as a Darknet vendor, 316 00:19:05,894 --> 00:19:09,523 you should be using something like Tails at the very least. 317 00:19:09,940 --> 00:19:12,609 And for those of you who are first time listeners, Tails 318 00:19:12,609 --> 00:19:16,905 is basically an operating system that runs Tor by default 319 00:19:16,905 --> 00:19:21,076 and deletes all the information that's put on it when it's restarted 320 00:19:22,161 --> 00:19:24,329 or when the is turned off. 321 00:19:24,329 --> 00:19:27,916 This is known as a live OS or a live operating system. 322 00:19:27,916 --> 00:19:30,127 In other words, it has amnesia. 323 00:19:30,127 --> 00:19:33,130 So you do whatever you want on it 324 00:19:33,130 --> 00:19:35,591 and when you restarted, everything is gone. 325 00:19:37,176 --> 00:19:39,344 There's a good reason why this operating system 326 00:19:39,344 --> 00:19:42,890 is set up precisely like this. 327 00:19:42,890 --> 00:19:46,977 Like no doubt, James, as a 25 year Army veteran 328 00:19:48,061 --> 00:19:50,147 had heard the term operational security 329 00:19:50,147 --> 00:19:55,402 and personal security and most likely had known 330 00:19:55,694 --> 00:19:59,740 at least a little bit about how vital information security is. 331 00:19:59,740 --> 00:20:02,826 And this is precisely why it is so surprising 332 00:20:02,951 --> 00:20:06,705 and disappointing to me to find out that during the investigation, 333 00:20:06,705 --> 00:20:11,001 when the feds looked at his Google drive, they were able to find 334 00:20:11,001 --> 00:20:15,547 a bunch of different spreadsheets with various information on them. 335 00:20:15,964 --> 00:20:18,842 For both, the trip was science data 336 00:20:19,134 --> 00:20:22,304 and for another dark vendor account 337 00:20:22,554 --> 00:20:26,516 that James had helped to run called Perfect Shrooms. 338 00:20:26,516 --> 00:20:30,395 Yeah, like the Google Drive thing really, really disappointed me. 339 00:20:30,729 --> 00:20:32,940 Horrible or horrible OPSEC 340 00:20:33,607 --> 00:20:36,068 for example, one tab in 341 00:20:36,068 --> 00:20:38,904 one of his Google Drive spreadsheets was titled 342 00:20:39,696 --> 00:20:43,825 Open quote 2015 received close quote. 343 00:20:44,743 --> 00:20:49,665 It showed 704 different transactions which ended up totaling 344 00:20:50,082 --> 00:20:53,502 to be over 1544 bitcoins 345 00:20:55,295 --> 00:20:57,047 on a different spreadsheet. 346 00:20:57,047 --> 00:20:59,549 Bitcoin income for each year was recorded. 347 00:21:00,133 --> 00:21:04,513 This showed that he had earned about 2300 bitcoins 348 00:21:04,930 --> 00:21:08,350 from 2014 to 2020. 349 00:21:09,559 --> 00:21:13,105 At the same time, he was also making $4,000 a month 350 00:21:13,563 --> 00:21:17,567 working for the United States Army as a sergeant first class. 351 00:21:17,567 --> 00:21:21,238 According to the DOJ, their search warrant application. 352 00:21:21,238 --> 00:21:25,659 Anyways, James also had outsourced a ton of the work 353 00:21:25,659 --> 00:21:30,122 for his Darknet vendor account to third parties, which 354 00:21:31,331 --> 00:21:33,166 really surprised me too, because again, it's 355 00:21:33,166 --> 00:21:36,461 a massive risk in terms of OPSEC. 356 00:21:37,212 --> 00:21:39,673 So for example, James would pay nearly six 357 00:21:39,673 --> 00:21:45,637 grand in crypto every two weeks to a reshipper This guy was supposed 358 00:21:45,637 --> 00:21:51,435 to package up the liquid from a big state into these small vials. 359 00:21:51,435 --> 00:21:55,647 And unfortunately, the OPSEC screw ups don't stop there. 360 00:21:56,023 --> 00:22:01,028 In addition to James running the DTO with his brother, he also ran 361 00:22:01,028 --> 00:22:06,825 a few other businesses, most of them like he sold shirts with LED lights in them 362 00:22:06,867 --> 00:22:11,288 and some of the company's names for the shirts were were things like 363 00:22:12,414 --> 00:22:13,832 Good to Glo and 364 00:22:13,832 --> 00:22:16,835 Illuminati Contour, which is kind of funny. 365 00:22:17,836 --> 00:22:20,756 The Department of Justice, however, noted that James 366 00:22:21,506 --> 00:22:26,845 quote was not generating enough if any, income from these businesses 367 00:22:27,179 --> 00:22:31,767 to support his lifestyle, which included travel on private jets, 368 00:22:32,267 --> 00:22:37,272 world travel, producing, purchasing of high end automobiles 369 00:22:37,689 --> 00:22:41,068 and ownership of multiple properties, unquote. 370 00:22:42,402 --> 00:22:46,114 And one of these properties was worth like one and a half million dollars, 371 00:22:46,698 --> 00:22:51,036 which, you know, he had bought in March, in addition to 372 00:22:52,496 --> 00:22:54,706 two that he also owned like two Teslas 373 00:22:54,706 --> 00:22:57,793 and purchased two others for friends. 374 00:22:57,793 --> 00:22:59,169 In recent years. 375 00:22:59,169 --> 00:23:04,633 In addition to that, according to the DOJ, he also own two jet skis. 376 00:23:04,633 --> 00:23:06,093 And like, 377 00:23:06,468 --> 00:23:09,763 as if that wasn't bad enough, the real kicker 378 00:23:09,805 --> 00:23:14,476 going through all this stuff was like the fact that he had a basically 379 00:23:14,976 --> 00:23:19,815 a video confession on his Google Drive discussing 380 00:23:20,482 --> 00:23:23,360 how he bought a land in Colorado using Bitcoin. 381 00:23:23,402 --> 00:23:25,904 So this begs the question, how is James court 382 00:23:26,863 --> 00:23:27,489 really big 383 00:23:27,489 --> 00:23:30,700 mystery, you know, given the information that we just covered, But 384 00:23:31,785 --> 00:23:33,328 what was the final nail in the coffin? 385 00:23:33,328 --> 00:23:36,415 I guess, you know, in a word, Coinbase 386 00:23:37,666 --> 00:23:39,292 for the record, 387 00:23:39,418 --> 00:23:41,711 let's just say for more than five years 388 00:23:41,711 --> 00:23:44,047 I've been telling people to stay away from Coinbase. 389 00:23:44,840 --> 00:23:48,718 I have criticized them and also centralized 390 00:23:48,718 --> 00:23:52,597 trash exchanges and wallets for a long time. 391 00:23:53,140 --> 00:23:57,185 For those that don't know, Coinbase is a digital currency exchange, 392 00:23:57,185 --> 00:24:01,440 and while I applied Farm and you know, they heart the feds 393 00:24:01,898 --> 00:24:05,444 so stay away from Coinbase, you know, give your business to someone else. 394 00:24:05,444 --> 00:24:11,366 You know, basically they set it up so you can buy and sell Bitcoin, etherium 395 00:24:11,741 --> 00:24:13,869 and, you know, other coins 396 00:24:14,536 --> 00:24:19,332 founded in 2012 in San Francisco and there are many reasons 397 00:24:19,332 --> 00:24:22,210 why I would say them, you know, for one, 398 00:24:22,961 --> 00:24:27,132 they're the downfall of a lot of different people who transact on the darknet. 399 00:24:27,174 --> 00:24:30,552 Unfortunately, they're liable to report you to the feds if they see 400 00:24:30,552 --> 00:24:34,931 you sending money to a particular Bitcoin address so they can sort of shady. 401 00:24:35,432 --> 00:24:35,640 Yeah. 402 00:24:35,640 --> 00:24:36,725 So have high fees, 403 00:24:36,725 --> 00:24:42,105 limited coins, lousy user experience, and a complete and total lack of privacy. 404 00:24:42,105 --> 00:24:44,983 And they've been hacked repeatedly in the past. 405 00:24:44,983 --> 00:24:49,571 That's not even getting into their like, you know, insider trading that they do 406 00:24:49,571 --> 00:24:54,326 or disallowing withdrawals periodically when a currency goes down. 407 00:24:54,326 --> 00:24:56,703 Like I go on and on. 408 00:24:56,703 --> 00:25:02,292 If you're going to use Bitcoin, learn to use cold wallets and proper hot wallets. 409 00:25:02,626 --> 00:25:05,337 Learn to use things like bisque 410 00:25:05,504 --> 00:25:08,089 and other non KYC platforms, 411 00:25:08,507 --> 00:25:13,929 you know, preferably decentralized ones, no bisque B-I-S-Q, 412 00:25:13,970 --> 00:25:16,306 for example, you know, automatically runs Tor 413 00:25:16,389 --> 00:25:19,518 you know, as soon as you start it up like store by default. 414 00:25:19,518 --> 00:25:22,395 So and KYC is trash and 415 00:25:23,605 --> 00:25:26,066 you know, you have a ton of alternatives that are out there. 416 00:25:26,066 --> 00:25:29,402 So like, you know, stop supporting these garbage companies 417 00:25:29,402 --> 00:25:32,822 that'll trade you up to the feds at a moment's notice. 418 00:25:32,822 --> 00:25:34,908 You know, like it just makes no sense. 419 00:25:34,908 --> 00:25:39,579 Areas On October 22nd of 2020, the trial of Homeland Security 420 00:25:40,247 --> 00:25:45,043 had received information from a seized darknet market that contained over 421 00:25:45,043 --> 00:25:49,923 30 Bitcoin transactions to a wallet that belonged to TripWithScience. 422 00:25:51,174 --> 00:25:54,636 Specifically, though, it belonged to his brother Matt, who, 423 00:25:54,636 --> 00:26:00,517 as we'll cover later on in this is, you know, far from the brighter bulb. 424 00:26:00,559 --> 00:26:04,521 The fact that these transactions were done with the same wallet 425 00:26:04,521 --> 00:26:08,358 alone is terrible like remember we're not talking about 426 00:26:09,526 --> 00:26:11,361 like individual sales here. 427 00:26:11,361 --> 00:26:12,612 Well, that would be understandable. 428 00:26:12,612 --> 00:26:18,285 We're talking about cashing out Bitcoin from a market to another wallet. So 429 00:26:19,369 --> 00:26:20,245 as I said to 430 00:26:20,245 --> 00:26:23,540 James, is credit like this wall belonged to his brother Matt. 431 00:26:24,165 --> 00:26:27,252 And like Matt had sold over 300 Bitcoin 432 00:26:27,586 --> 00:26:31,006 and made almost $1,000,000 with this particular wallet. 433 00:26:31,506 --> 00:26:34,634 So to give you an idea of how old this wallet was, 434 00:26:34,634 --> 00:26:37,721 he had also purchased one Bitcoin, 435 00:26:37,721 --> 00:26:43,143 which had been valued at $188.94 at the time. 436 00:26:44,519 --> 00:26:50,317 Yeah, nobody was going to sell me on the idea that this dude, you know, 437 00:26:50,317 --> 00:26:55,780 could not have changed his a coin wallet in that amount of time, 438 00:26:56,406 --> 00:26:59,701 especially because it's only cost you money to create a wallet. 439 00:27:00,118 --> 00:27:01,077 You know, 440 00:27:01,911 --> 00:27:04,623 on top of this, when Coinbase was subpoenaed 441 00:27:04,623 --> 00:27:09,210 the information the feds you know, got also revealed that many times 442 00:27:10,295 --> 00:27:12,422 is shipping items he used to pack 443 00:27:12,422 --> 00:27:15,925 and ship, you know, these fake mushrooms. 444 00:27:15,925 --> 00:27:19,179 You know throughout the world were also ordered with the same account 445 00:27:20,138 --> 00:27:22,682 brilliant OPSEC there 446 00:27:24,184 --> 00:27:25,810 a company called Shift 447 00:27:25,810 --> 00:27:29,731 payments was used from the Coinbase account. 448 00:27:30,065 --> 00:27:34,819 Over six purchases were made from another company called Thomas Scientific. 449 00:27:35,654 --> 00:27:39,616 After investing years, Google, This company has an incredibly 450 00:27:39,616 --> 00:27:42,577 in-depth, you know, researcher. 451 00:27:42,577 --> 00:27:46,498 They saw that it sells numerous laboratory chemical instruments 452 00:27:46,623 --> 00:27:49,668 and other lab equipment. 453 00:27:49,834 --> 00:27:51,711 There are many instances 454 00:27:51,711 --> 00:27:55,799 of specific operational security screw ups in this case, 455 00:27:55,799 --> 00:28:00,095 and they're riddled throughout the documentation in this case. 456 00:28:00,428 --> 00:28:04,265 Another example was on December 14th in 2016, 457 00:28:04,724 --> 00:28:09,229 when they used their Coinbase account in conjunction with Swift payments, again 458 00:28:09,688 --> 00:28:12,857 to purchase stickers from a place called Sticker Mule. 459 00:28:13,775 --> 00:28:17,529 Presumably, Sticker Mule was used to make labels 460 00:28:17,529 --> 00:28:20,323 for some of their packaging and some of their products. 461 00:28:21,616 --> 00:28:24,285 It seems like the feds really didn't even investigate this. 462 00:28:24,285 --> 00:28:27,997 Like there seemed to be so much evidence at this point, 463 00:28:27,997 --> 00:28:31,751 like against the brothers that like the feds just kind of stopped 464 00:28:31,751 --> 00:28:36,548 investigating certain angles regarding finding new evidence like these stickers, 465 00:28:36,548 --> 00:28:41,177 like they just didn't mention them again, in the documentation that I saw, 466 00:28:42,178 --> 00:28:44,681 a ton of transactions like this 467 00:28:44,931 --> 00:28:47,559 came from the barrio Brothers Coinbase accounts. 468 00:28:49,185 --> 00:28:51,521 Thanks to this ridiculously 469 00:28:51,521 --> 00:28:55,275 trash ops, investigators followed Barlow and managed 470 00:28:55,275 --> 00:28:58,778 to intercept many of the packages sent from him. 471 00:28:59,738 --> 00:29:03,491 Some of these packages were sent from his other alias Perfect mushrooms. 472 00:29:03,950 --> 00:29:09,247 Using this information was how they got a search warrant for his Google account. 473 00:29:09,247 --> 00:29:12,542 The Google account in question was Jim 474 00:29:12,542 --> 00:29:15,754 Dodd v, Dodd Barlow at gmail.com. 475 00:29:15,754 --> 00:29:19,966 Super high end OPSEC here, totally disconnected from what we really was. 476 00:29:21,426 --> 00:29:25,722 Investigators found on the G-Drive for this account 477 00:29:26,681 --> 00:29:30,310 even more crazy and incriminating evidence on James. 478 00:29:30,310 --> 00:29:34,105 So for example, when they went through what they found besides aside 479 00:29:34,105 --> 00:29:39,402 from the spreadsheets that we already talked about, 480 00:29:39,402 --> 00:29:44,574 they found images that showed containers and bags of mushrooms 481 00:29:45,074 --> 00:29:50,580 with the very famous signature scientist icon, which is the 482 00:29:50,663 --> 00:29:54,125 the trooper science icon and the script, 483 00:29:55,001 --> 00:29:57,545 quote, u forward slash 484 00:29:57,545 --> 00:30:01,007 trooper science. 485 00:30:01,007 --> 00:30:04,844 So for anyone who has seen his listings online, we all know 486 00:30:04,844 --> 00:30:07,764 very well the older scientists with the crazy way here 487 00:30:08,056 --> 00:30:12,060 that, you know, holding the test tube, That's his signature logo. 488 00:30:12,101 --> 00:30:13,019 Okay. 489 00:30:13,019 --> 00:30:15,814 And for those of you, though, use it on 490 00:30:15,814 --> 00:30:18,900 Reddit, different sections are called Subreddits. 491 00:30:18,900 --> 00:30:21,361 These are like mini forums. Okay. 492 00:30:21,736 --> 00:30:26,574 So typically different sections are like different subject matter 493 00:30:27,534 --> 00:30:28,284 and those 494 00:30:28,284 --> 00:30:30,620 sections are typically highlighted with an R. 495 00:30:31,371 --> 00:30:34,249 So for example, if you were to go 496 00:30:34,249 --> 00:30:38,002 to a subreddit about bunnies, it might be like Reddit. 497 00:30:38,002 --> 00:30:41,714 Com forward slash r forward slash bunnies. 498 00:30:42,215 --> 00:30:45,218 If you were to look up an individual user, however, 499 00:30:45,468 --> 00:30:48,429 the R would be replaced with a you. 500 00:30:48,429 --> 00:30:53,476 So for example, like my username on Reddit is reserved still nine the number nine. 501 00:30:53,893 --> 00:30:58,439 So if you already had the whole Reddit com 502 00:30:58,481 --> 00:31:01,526 it would be like reddit.com/u/reservesteel9 503 00:31:05,113 --> 00:31:09,325 So the URL, that's how it structured. 504 00:31:09,325 --> 00:31:16,207 So on this picture him having u/tripwithscience, it was his darknet 505 00:31:16,875 --> 00:31:21,546 vendor logo with his Reddit user name written underneath it 506 00:31:21,546 --> 00:31:27,886 as an emblem stored on his g-drive and his Gmail account. 507 00:31:27,886 --> 00:31:32,098 Are you kidding me? 508 00:31:32,098 --> 00:31:36,644 With the certainty that James has accomplished far 509 00:31:36,644 --> 00:31:42,191 more than I in sales and length of time being a Darknet vendor? Like 510 00:31:43,526 --> 00:31:45,820 all of this is really a shock to me. 511 00:31:45,820 --> 00:31:50,909 Perhaps it's just like my naivete to think that some of these big guys are 512 00:31:51,659 --> 00:31:54,954 or much more well known Darknet vendors 513 00:31:55,455 --> 00:31:58,791 would actually take OPSEC as seriously as I do, 514 00:31:58,833 --> 00:32:02,837 but it's just always so disappointing to actually analyze their security. 515 00:32:03,546 --> 00:32:07,008 And finally, just these ridiculous OPSEC fails 516 00:32:07,425 --> 00:32:11,304 that I just I feel like a 10th grader would do better. 517 00:32:11,554 --> 00:32:13,723 It's just ridiculous. 518 00:32:13,723 --> 00:32:17,018 It is disappointing to see like a Darknet vendor who is operating for 519 00:32:17,018 --> 00:32:21,230 so long have such inadequate operation security, like 520 00:32:22,690 --> 00:32:26,235 the accounting sheet that I mentioned earlier was just a one off. 521 00:32:26,235 --> 00:32:30,907 Like after the feds had done a complete search of the drive, they recovered tabs 522 00:32:31,741 --> 00:32:37,664 of like spreadsheets going back to 2014, along with income reports. 523 00:32:37,664 --> 00:32:40,083 They also found expense reports. 524 00:32:40,083 --> 00:32:43,211 His yearly income in 2014, for example, 525 00:32:43,544 --> 00:32:48,049 was $211,000, basically. 526 00:32:48,549 --> 00:32:51,761 And by 2021 year increase that 527 00:32:53,429 --> 00:32:54,639 those yearly earnings 528 00:32:54,639 --> 00:32:58,309 to 2,800,000 something. 529 00:32:58,518 --> 00:33:02,146 So definitely, you know, jumped up there in terms of what he was making. 530 00:33:03,231 --> 00:33:05,692 But as as many of you do like, 531 00:33:05,733 --> 00:33:08,695 know who listen to this show, watch me on my YouTube channel. 532 00:33:09,028 --> 00:33:11,322 I'm a stickler for paperwork. 533 00:33:11,322 --> 00:33:15,910 Many of you been to federal prison know precisely what I mean. 534 00:33:15,952 --> 00:33:20,206 One of the first things I do when looking at a different case 535 00:33:20,206 --> 00:33:24,919 or a Darknet vendor who's been called to see if I'll discuss them on 536 00:33:24,919 --> 00:33:30,425 this podcast is to go after and review in depth their paperwork. 537 00:33:30,425 --> 00:33:32,260 It's my go to individuals. 538 00:33:32,260 --> 00:33:36,014 Paperwork is totally removed from that individual. 539 00:33:36,055 --> 00:33:39,642 Typically a person's interpretation of an events 540 00:33:39,934 --> 00:33:42,979 can be skewed when looking at paperwork. 541 00:33:42,979 --> 00:33:46,315 I find that you have a more solid understanding 542 00:33:46,315 --> 00:33:49,444 of that person through other people's eyes and 543 00:33:50,445 --> 00:33:52,030 like that person nine times 544 00:33:52,030 --> 00:33:54,073 out of ten, as I'm going to tell you, if they told on someone. 545 00:33:55,783 --> 00:33:59,704 So, for example, the United States attorney, nine times out of ten says that 546 00:33:59,704 --> 00:34:03,666 the individual that they're prosecuting is the worst offender in in history. 547 00:34:04,000 --> 00:34:07,670 Like I'm paraphrasing, but essentially the prosecution will try 548 00:34:07,670 --> 00:34:11,632 to make the defendant look as evil as they possibly can 549 00:34:11,716 --> 00:34:16,304 to the longest ends that they possibly can to make a name for themselves. 550 00:34:16,304 --> 00:34:18,014 Like, that's how simple it is. 551 00:34:18,014 --> 00:34:20,683 Like, I'm going to put you in prison for 30 years, 552 00:34:20,683 --> 00:34:24,645 because then I can say maybe at the end of the year that, you know, 553 00:34:24,645 --> 00:34:30,193 I put people in prison for a total of 600 years or something. 554 00:34:30,193 --> 00:34:31,778 That's what it is like. 555 00:34:31,778 --> 00:34:34,197 And the defense will do the total opposite. 556 00:34:34,197 --> 00:34:40,078 They'll try to make the individual as humanized in passive as possible 557 00:34:40,078 --> 00:34:45,374 in terms of being active in a conspiracy or any criminal activity. 558 00:34:46,334 --> 00:34:47,085 They'll often try 559 00:34:47,085 --> 00:34:51,923 to justify that person's actions if they can, or if they can't do that, 560 00:34:51,923 --> 00:34:57,261 maybe casts doubt on them being involved or explain why the individual 561 00:34:57,261 --> 00:35:02,266 had committed specific actions at certain times and how those actions 562 00:35:02,266 --> 00:35:03,434 were actually for a good reason. 563 00:35:03,434 --> 00:35:08,022 That said, I would be remiss if I didn't include in this podcast 564 00:35:08,564 --> 00:35:12,693 James's lawyer who kicked some serious ass when it comes to this 565 00:35:13,486 --> 00:35:16,322 reading through the sentencing memorandum his lawyer wrote. 566 00:35:16,364 --> 00:35:20,409 Like, you could tell that the lawyer or paralegal who wrote 567 00:35:20,409 --> 00:35:24,789 it really put some effort forward to humanize him. 568 00:35:24,789 --> 00:35:27,458 And this really didn't do the same for his brother. 569 00:35:27,458 --> 00:35:29,377 When I read his brother's sentencing memorandum, 570 00:35:29,377 --> 00:35:33,297 when I look at his paperwork, I mean, when I look at paperwork in general, 571 00:35:33,548 --> 00:35:38,845 I want to know if an individual that I want to talk about is informant or a rat 572 00:35:40,471 --> 00:35:41,472 If they are, 573 00:35:41,472 --> 00:35:44,392 then it'll be one of the first things that I tell you 574 00:35:45,226 --> 00:35:47,562 as a listener. 575 00:35:47,562 --> 00:35:51,357 It will also be something that I point out periodically throughout the podcast 576 00:35:51,357 --> 00:35:52,650 to remind you of. 577 00:35:52,650 --> 00:35:55,695 I feel it's a great personality indicator 578 00:35:55,695 --> 00:35:59,240 and an indicator of how responsible an individual is. 579 00:35:59,240 --> 00:36:01,742 And when I say how responsible an individual is, 580 00:36:01,993 --> 00:36:06,706 I mean the level of cowardice they're willing to stoop to to get away 581 00:36:06,706 --> 00:36:10,710 from their own case and the repercussions for their own actions 582 00:36:11,836 --> 00:36:14,797 by using others as scapegoats 583 00:36:14,797 --> 00:36:18,885 and putting those people on the chopping block in their place. 584 00:36:19,927 --> 00:36:23,806 To me, it's like watching the Salem Witch trials, right? 585 00:36:24,140 --> 00:36:29,228 You start off with a bunch of girls who get in trouble for dancing in the woods, 586 00:36:29,687 --> 00:36:33,858 and at the end of the day, you're handing out life sentences. 587 00:36:33,858 --> 00:36:37,195 So by the end of that, they're burning women at the stake. 588 00:36:37,528 --> 00:36:38,196 Okay? 589 00:36:38,196 --> 00:36:40,615 And like, that's such a life sentence right there. 590 00:36:41,240 --> 00:36:44,368 And as far as James goes, like, I won't lie. 591 00:36:44,368 --> 00:36:48,164 I was I was seriously envious of this guy's sense. 592 00:36:49,248 --> 00:36:51,334 And at the same time, I was really suspicious of it. 593 00:36:51,334 --> 00:36:56,047 Like but I didn't find anything in his paperwork that showed definitively 594 00:36:56,923 --> 00:36:59,175 or even kind of pointed to the fact 595 00:36:59,175 --> 00:37:01,344 that he cooperated with authorities. 596 00:37:02,386 --> 00:37:04,597 And that said, it doesn't mean that he didn't. 597 00:37:04,597 --> 00:37:09,435 It just means that like I didn't find anything indicating that he was a rat. 598 00:37:10,603 --> 00:37:12,563 If I don't have proof 599 00:37:12,563 --> 00:37:14,774 someone's cooperated in black and white 600 00:37:15,441 --> 00:37:19,695 where I can definitively prove it, I'm not going to levy that accusation. 601 00:37:19,904 --> 00:37:22,531 It's a serious accusation. 602 00:37:22,531 --> 00:37:25,076 And I would instead state that I have no clue because. 603 00:37:25,076 --> 00:37:26,744 At the end of the day, that's the truth. 604 00:37:26,744 --> 00:37:29,664 So what's crazy about James's paperwork is that 605 00:37:30,623 --> 00:37:33,542 he has two charges that he was found guilty of. 606 00:37:33,542 --> 00:37:37,129 The first is possession with intent to distribute marijuana, 607 00:37:37,463 --> 00:37:39,674 and the second is money laundering. 608 00:37:39,674 --> 00:37:40,841 Both are felonies. 609 00:37:40,841 --> 00:37:44,512 And it's just weird because I remember when I said, like 610 00:37:44,512 --> 00:37:45,513 he wasn't selling mushrooms. 611 00:37:45,513 --> 00:37:49,809 Notice I was possession of mushrooms, intent to distribute mushrooms. 612 00:37:50,643 --> 00:37:52,812 In addition, he also had one count of intent 613 00:37:52,812 --> 00:37:55,398 to distribute marijuana, which was terminated. 614 00:37:57,024 --> 00:38:00,194 James also doesn't seem to have too much paperwork 615 00:38:00,194 --> 00:38:03,406 of going off his motion that his lawyers submitted for his sentencing. 616 00:38:03,406 --> 00:38:04,824 He states there. 617 00:38:04,824 --> 00:38:09,662 Now, James, upon his retirement, presumably from the military, 618 00:38:11,289 --> 00:38:13,666 transitioned back into civilian life 619 00:38:13,666 --> 00:38:16,752 and suffered crippling PTSD. 620 00:38:17,336 --> 00:38:20,923 His lawyer cites that these are the results of the things that he did 621 00:38:21,340 --> 00:38:25,386 and saw during his deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, 622 00:38:26,053 --> 00:38:28,806 In addition to other overseas deployments. 623 00:38:30,099 --> 00:38:33,144 His lawyer makes the case that James sought alternative 624 00:38:33,144 --> 00:38:37,106 treatments or nontraditional treatments for PTSD. 625 00:38:37,565 --> 00:38:39,358 And this is where, you know, 626 00:38:39,358 --> 00:38:42,194 he was first introduced to psychedelic mushrooms to begin with. 627 00:38:43,195 --> 00:38:46,324 Shortly after he had tried them, he started growing them 628 00:38:46,324 --> 00:38:48,326 and selling them in the motion. 629 00:38:48,326 --> 00:38:52,663 His lawyer states that he knew that this was against federal law at the time. 630 00:38:53,164 --> 00:38:58,586 Regarding the possession and use and sale of Psilocybin 631 00:38:59,587 --> 00:39:01,797 This doesn't really make sense given the fact 632 00:39:01,797 --> 00:39:06,344 that the use and sale of Psilocybin wasn't even a charge in this case. 633 00:39:06,344 --> 00:39:09,180 But James, his lawyer, further states that 634 00:39:10,431 --> 00:39:14,810 he ultimately couldn't turn a blind eye to the ongoing suffering of others, 635 00:39:15,186 --> 00:39:19,482 and he felt he could assist them by selling them mushrooms. 636 00:39:19,482 --> 00:39:24,195 And I'm sure that making 100 million 637 00:39:25,237 --> 00:39:27,448 for over a decade had nothing to do with them. 638 00:39:27,448 --> 00:39:31,452 But in the motion, James, his lawyer, admits that James started 639 00:39:31,786 --> 00:39:36,916 the DTO, which offered mushrooms to soldiers for relief from PTSD. 640 00:39:36,916 --> 00:39:40,920 In addition, besides the fact that mushrooms can also be an aid 641 00:39:41,295 --> 00:39:45,633 in opiate addiction, one thing I'll definitely say about 642 00:39:45,633 --> 00:39:50,262 James is like at the end of the day, he stayed true to what he was doing. 643 00:39:50,262 --> 00:39:55,267 Like you did not see him selling heroin, meth or any of this other stuff. 644 00:39:56,143 --> 00:39:56,685 And that's 645 00:39:57,770 --> 00:39:59,230 pretty awesome. 646 00:39:59,980 --> 00:40:01,399 And he was like a scammer. 647 00:40:01,399 --> 00:40:04,110 So, I mean, these are legitimate business guys. 648 00:40:04,151 --> 00:40:08,197 Now, legitimately, in terms of Darknet culture, I would say. 649 00:40:08,864 --> 00:40:11,200 So this motion was 650 00:40:12,284 --> 00:40:14,954 broken down in a sentencing motion 651 00:40:14,954 --> 00:40:18,457 like the United States attorney submits a motion saying, for example, 652 00:40:18,874 --> 00:40:21,961 like why you should get the amount of time they think you should get. 653 00:40:22,044 --> 00:40:26,841 Typically the, Max, your lawyer in turn submits a sentencing memorandum 654 00:40:26,841 --> 00:40:30,636 to it, says why they think you should get the minimum. 655 00:40:30,970 --> 00:40:34,682 Essentially, it's side argues for different things. 656 00:40:35,641 --> 00:40:38,686 And I felt I should clarify this a little bit that way. 657 00:40:38,769 --> 00:40:40,813 This with this point of view is coming from 658 00:40:42,314 --> 00:40:43,899 in the motion. 659 00:40:43,941 --> 00:40:48,362 James's lawyer says that James fully acknowledges that what he did was wrong. 660 00:40:49,363 --> 00:40:53,451 Still, he also wants to draw the court's attention to how many people 661 00:40:53,826 --> 00:40:58,873 therapeutically use this product to improve their lives, including addicts, 662 00:40:59,123 --> 00:41:04,295 soldiers and people suffering from crippling mental health problems. 663 00:41:05,588 --> 00:41:06,881 He states that 664 00:41:06,881 --> 00:41:10,426 this is not an excuse for his behavior, but rather an explanation. 665 00:41:11,051 --> 00:41:14,930 He also cites that it shows his motives and heart 666 00:41:15,598 --> 00:41:19,935 were behind the drug trafficking organization he had started. 667 00:41:19,935 --> 00:41:22,813 Like I love that like guy, though. 668 00:41:22,813 --> 00:41:27,109 That was absolutely like, like one guts to come out 669 00:41:27,109 --> 00:41:30,404 and put that in a motion there was absolutely phenomenal 670 00:41:31,614 --> 00:41:35,743 and mostly because I've absolutely plausible. 671 00:41:35,743 --> 00:41:39,163 And at the end of the day, there's just absolutely a ton of legitimate uses 672 00:41:39,497 --> 00:41:43,417 for Psilocybin and whether it's you have cluster headaches, micro dose, 673 00:41:43,709 --> 00:41:48,005 and those cluster addicts disappear when the regular doctors 674 00:41:48,005 --> 00:41:50,216 and pharmaceutical companies can't do anything 675 00:41:50,216 --> 00:41:53,344 but give you addictive opiates to deal with the pain. 676 00:41:53,677 --> 00:41:58,307 I get totally alleviated with Microdosing or the people who are on opiates 677 00:41:58,307 --> 00:42:01,936 who want to limit the of withdrawal 678 00:42:02,311 --> 00:42:05,231 will use mushrooms and microdosing 679 00:42:06,440 --> 00:42:09,818 to get off of opiates. 680 00:42:09,818 --> 00:42:12,780 Whereas like if you're a heroin addict and you go to a doctor 681 00:42:13,155 --> 00:42:16,325 and they're goign to give you methadone and you're gonna be doing that 682 00:42:16,325 --> 00:42:17,201 for the rest of your life. 683 00:42:17,201 --> 00:42:20,246 So it's like it's just a horrible cycle. 684 00:42:20,246 --> 00:42:23,749 And like if you can take some shrooms and alleviate that, I'm absolutely for that. 685 00:42:23,749 --> 00:42:27,127 So one fact I found interesting in going to this motion 686 00:42:28,420 --> 00:42:30,673 was that he had said that 687 00:42:30,673 --> 00:42:34,718 he had donated to various charities and disaster relief efforts 688 00:42:35,052 --> 00:42:39,932 with the proceeds he had made from his dark vendor business. 689 00:42:39,932 --> 00:42:41,559 And this is very true. 690 00:42:41,559 --> 00:42:45,688 Vice News even did an article on him titled, quote, 691 00:42:46,146 --> 00:42:49,149 Dark Web Dealer, allegedly Donates 692 00:42:49,149 --> 00:42:51,402 Drug Profits to Charity. 693 00:42:52,278 --> 00:42:55,489 And that article, if you want to look it up, dates back to October 694 00:42:55,489 --> 00:42:59,910 7th, 2015. 695 00:42:59,910 --> 00:43:03,872 Stories like this, I think, really illuminate that darknet. 696 00:43:03,872 --> 00:43:10,170 The Darknet vendors that are out there are not all equal to those hardcore, 697 00:43:10,170 --> 00:43:15,426 dangerous and violent individuals that we have in drug trafficking, 698 00:43:15,426 --> 00:43:18,012 like the many cartels that exist for example, 699 00:43:18,554 --> 00:43:23,767 we have a Darknet vendor who, regardless of what he did 700 00:43:23,767 --> 00:43:27,187 or how long he did it, backed up the fact that he did it 701 00:43:27,730 --> 00:43:32,526 for what many could perceive to be honorable reasons. 702 00:43:32,526 --> 00:43:36,530 I would be one of those people, and this is one of the few motions where 703 00:43:36,530 --> 00:43:41,118 I've seen a lawyer point out the health benefits of psychedelic mushrooms. 704 00:43:41,118 --> 00:43:43,996 And I feel that, you know, this is a fact. 705 00:43:43,996 --> 00:43:47,625 There are a ton of therapeutic uses for psychedelic mushrooms 706 00:43:47,625 --> 00:43:50,377 that benefit people in a positive way. 707 00:43:51,003 --> 00:43:56,425 And unfortunately, the drug market has a lot of financial incentives 708 00:43:56,425 --> 00:44:01,597 to stay within the current corrupt big pharma kind of alternatives. 709 00:44:01,597 --> 00:44:04,808 And if I were to believe that the government is truthful or honest, 710 00:44:05,559 --> 00:44:08,771 I would say that the FDA is also classified. 711 00:44:09,313 --> 00:44:12,066 The chemical that makes people Psilocybin 712 00:44:12,399 --> 00:44:15,694 in mushrooms as a breakthrough therapy 713 00:44:16,862 --> 00:44:19,073 like this is essentially designed 714 00:44:19,073 --> 00:44:23,535 to speed up the process of FDA approval for those. 715 00:44:23,535 --> 00:44:26,622 Psilocybin And the funny thing is, the drug was around long 716 00:44:26,622 --> 00:44:29,291 before the United States existed. 717 00:44:30,542 --> 00:44:34,213 Like, I love how our government tries to act like now. 718 00:44:35,214 --> 00:44:38,759 It's some fantastic and revolutionary 719 00:44:38,759 --> 00:44:42,554 breakthrough that they didn't know about until just now. It's 720 00:44:43,597 --> 00:44:45,849 asinine. It is just so ridiculous. 721 00:44:45,849 --> 00:44:49,019 Anyways, if nothing else, like, you have to respect the fact 722 00:44:49,019 --> 00:44:52,147 that the man ran a DTO for almost a decade. 723 00:44:53,273 --> 00:44:54,024 Yeah, true. 724 00:44:54,024 --> 00:44:57,778 He probably should have spent his money more carefully, more wisely, 725 00:44:58,237 --> 00:45:01,615 and not bought as much flashy crap. 726 00:45:01,615 --> 00:45:04,618 And no, he definitely should not have put stuff 727 00:45:04,618 --> 00:45:07,329 on his Google Drive or his Google account. 728 00:45:07,955 --> 00:45:08,747 He definitely shouldn't. 729 00:45:08,747 --> 00:45:12,918 And cab records, man, he definitely should not have had 730 00:45:12,918 --> 00:45:17,715 his brother who is far from qualified to run anything, run what he was running. 731 00:45:17,715 --> 00:45:21,635 But like at the end of the day, he killed it as how long he was a darknet 732 00:45:21,635 --> 00:45:25,764 vendor for and how much money he made. 733 00:45:25,764 --> 00:45:28,600 He crushed in terms of money 734 00:45:28,809 --> 00:45:32,521 and for selling one drug for selling a hallucinogen at that. 735 00:45:32,521 --> 00:45:33,689 It's like you selling heroin. 736 00:45:33,689 --> 00:45:36,066 Just that really blew my mind. 737 00:45:36,066 --> 00:45:37,484 A super niche drug. 738 00:45:37,484 --> 00:45:42,656 That said, in the sentencing memorandum, his lawyer asked for the courts 739 00:45:42,656 --> 00:45:46,660 to give him one year in prison. 740 00:45:46,660 --> 00:45:49,580 Ultimately, James was given three years in prison. 741 00:45:50,831 --> 00:45:51,290 His brother 742 00:45:51,290 --> 00:45:55,419 Matthew was given a much lighter sentence. 743 00:45:55,419 --> 00:45:57,713 Matthew was sentenced to time served. If 744 00:45:59,465 --> 00:46:01,550 you read both sentencing memorandums, 745 00:46:01,800 --> 00:46:05,721 the comparison between the the two is like comical 746 00:46:06,847 --> 00:46:08,098 James and Matthew. 747 00:46:08,098 --> 00:46:11,518 It's like the equivalent from what I read. 748 00:46:11,518 --> 00:46:15,564 It's like the equivalent of the difference between the identical twins 749 00:46:15,564 --> 00:46:18,901 that you see featured in the movie Eagle Eye Four. 750 00:46:19,401 --> 00:46:24,656 And if you haven't seen the movie, it's like one brother is highly achieving 751 00:46:25,199 --> 00:46:29,286 knowledgeable military member who went to like Ivy League schools 752 00:46:29,661 --> 00:46:32,956 while the other brother and this is quite literally 753 00:46:32,956 --> 00:46:37,711 in the sentencing memorandum for Matthew, barely graduated high school 754 00:46:38,796 --> 00:46:41,465 and actually dropped out of high school and got his GED later, 755 00:46:42,132 --> 00:46:44,384 according to his tenancy memorandum. 756 00:46:44,384 --> 00:46:48,806 And his car is his most valuable asset, which is 2014 Toyota, 757 00:46:48,806 --> 00:46:51,850 which was previously valued at $7,000. 758 00:46:51,850 --> 00:46:54,686 So there are so a few additional defendants in this case, 759 00:46:54,978 --> 00:46:56,772 like Jennifer Campbell. 760 00:46:56,772 --> 00:46:58,482 Jennifer lived with Matt. 761 00:46:58,482 --> 00:47:03,821 And according to the lawyers, the in the memorandum 762 00:47:04,363 --> 00:47:07,032 had an equal role in the conspiracy. 763 00:47:07,032 --> 00:47:10,118 That's what Matthew's lawyer argued. 764 00:47:10,118 --> 00:47:10,661 Anyways, 765 00:47:11,620 --> 00:47:12,663 Jennifer was given 766 00:47:12,663 --> 00:47:16,875 a home confinement, which is that's awesome. 767 00:47:16,875 --> 00:47:18,126 Except 768 00:47:19,002 --> 00:47:21,296 in this case, the person who got the worst 769 00:47:21,296 --> 00:47:24,299 was the head of the DTO, 770 00:47:24,299 --> 00:47:25,175 which is James. 771 00:47:25,175 --> 00:47:29,847 And this makes sense as this is typically how these things go. 772 00:47:29,847 --> 00:47:33,225 I mean, that that said, for the amount of money that James made 773 00:47:33,600 --> 00:47:37,020 and the amount of time that he did it for, like 774 00:47:37,062 --> 00:47:40,816 it was absolutely mind blowing to me that he had three years. 775 00:47:41,441 --> 00:47:44,069 I think it's a good thing because it's a nonviolent drug crime. 776 00:47:44,194 --> 00:47:47,406 I don't even think there should be a prison term for it. 777 00:47:47,406 --> 00:47:52,160 I mean, I'm like, you didn't hurt anyone and just you conducted a business 778 00:47:52,160 --> 00:47:55,289 like the government really wants to 779 00:47:55,289 --> 00:47:57,457 just pay taxes, like at the end of the day. 780 00:47:57,833 --> 00:48:00,586 And I'm sure James would say that three years is too much 781 00:48:01,628 --> 00:48:03,463 and I would agree with him. 782 00:48:03,463 --> 00:48:05,591 So what are your thoughts on this case? 783 00:48:05,591 --> 00:48:08,969 Like, do you think that the sentences were just for this? 784 00:48:08,969 --> 00:48:15,517 Do you think what do you think about the OPSEC of James and Matt, like in this? 785 00:48:15,517 --> 00:48:17,644 I'd love to hear your thoughts on it. 786 00:48:17,644 --> 00:48:20,439 Stop by the YouTube channel, which is doing Fed time 787 00:48:20,772 --> 00:48:25,485 and drop by in the comments and let me know until next time. 788 00:48:25,736 --> 00:48:27,863 Stay safe, secure 789 00:48:28,614 --> 00:48:36,997 and free.