By Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon Substack
SDNY COURTHOUSE, July 11– Roger Thomas Clark pleaded guilty to his role in Silk Road on January 30, 2020, after a period of confinement in Thailand.
He allocuted to sale of LSD, meth, heroin and cocaine for sale in NYC. He was asked if it was connected to "an underground website known as the Silk Road" and said yes.
On March 7, 2023 U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York Judge Sidney H. Stein held a proceeding. Inner City Press went and covered it, see below.
On July 11, 2023, Judge Stein sentenced Clark to 20 years - but not before Clarke described in detail corruption at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn. Inner City Press thread here
All rise!
Judge Stein: The pre-sentencing report was from 2020, updated Nov 2022.
Defense: My client wants another adjournment. He has not completed his written submission. He cannot finish it - but only wants to explain under seal. Judge: It's been 3 years
Judge: I sense that Mr Clarke does not want to be sentenced. He says he wants to describe his victimization in Thailand. Doesn't he want to be designated out of the MDC? Get some fresh air? I will consider this. But I deny any further adjournment
Defense: We want time served. Judge: Guideline is life in prison, but capped by statute at 20 years. Defense: He was been detained 5 years. He is motivated and loyal to his projects. He has family in Canada. He is not remorseful for saying DEA should be abolished
Defense: He committed crimes in part due to his political beliefs. He has described in Thailand prison being forced to watch rapes. He himself was victimised. Then he has pigeonholed by a BOP "expert."
Defense: He fell in his cell in the MDC and broke bones. They left him there overnight. Then at NYU Langone he has not allowed to speak to anyone for 11 days. Roger Clark got involved with Silk Road not for money but because it was something he was interested in
AUSA: We ask for the full 20 years.
Clark: Get a good look at me, [turns and looks at Press] I'll probably be killed after this. They came to search the MDC. They put a note under my cell door, you can keep your phone for $250, send money by CashApp or Zoele
Clark: But someone switched the notes, to say send it to another account. So it was a huge problem. The night I broke my pelvis is the night they returning people's phones to them. CO "Bonus" said he wouldn't call medical. The contraband was being returned for money
Clark: At NYU Langone they didn't let me speak because if I died someone would be charged with felony murder. My lawyer later raised it to the judge. SIS "did d*ck"
Judge: Tell me about the Dark Web. Clark: I bought from NSO and designed exploits to identify people on TOR, Project Playpen, I helped cases in all 11 Circuits, I was playing sheriff on the Dark Web
Clark: At Silk Road we tried to test the drugs. I told myself, Harm reduction. Then I studied Ross' appeal. After my brush with death, I withdrew mt objection to the PSR on 6 overdose deaths
Clark: I've disappointed my family, I've lost my God and I've lost my freedom. Judge Stein: I intend to impose the twenty year sentence. Silk Road distributed drugs and hacking tools
Judge: Mr Clark has described corruption in the MDC. He should tell the prosecutors of the SDNY [who are here and have heard it all]
More detail on Substack here
Back in March, Clark was brought in by US Marshals in a non-electric wheelchair. He was representing himself, with a stand-by CJA counsel. He told Judge Stein he had lost his legal material while in the SHU at the MDC in Brooklyn, and that he still thought he had COVID, citing a "false negative."
Judge Stein reviewed the procedural history of the case and opined that Clark had been trying to delay sentencing. Clark said he doesn't even have a pen, and asked to have his stand-by appointed as his lawyer.
The stand-by said that while he gets along with Clark, the two do not agree on strategy. He was nevertheless appointed, for the purpose of making an April 21 filing, only that scope, not other legal research requested by Clark. We're not going to re-litigate this case, Clark was told. And, there will be no new lawyer after this.
(Clark asked to have the courtroom sealed, but Inner City Press held its ground. Judge Stein noted, correctly, that there is a high standard to seal a courtroom in a Federal criminal case).
Sentencing was set for May 18 at 10:30 am.
The case is US v. Clark, 15-cr-866 (Stein)
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