Jared Der-Yeghiayan described Silk Road’s payments, his undercover staff work, and surveillance of Ross Ulbricht at Glen Park library. He explained a conditional plan to test whether Ulbricht was Dread Pirate Roberts. The court addressed authentication and hearsay objections, distinguishing evidentiary findings from ultimate conclusions and limiting the uses of some exhibits.
Full day summary
Jared Der-Yeghiayan continued direct testimony about Silk Road’s marketplace and the government’s undercover investigation. Homepage screenshots showed drug listings increasing from 2,020 in April 2012 to 13,810 on October 1, 2013. He explained bitcoin payments, escrow, commissions, and undercover purchases. A separately admitted laboratory stipulation stated that all but one of 52 submitted substances tested positive for illegal drugs. He also described a built-in bitcoin tumbler as making tracing less easy, not impossible.
Der-Yeghiayan testified that a support staff member authorized government use of the cirrus account in late July 2013, including marketplace and forum access. He distinguished the previous account holder’s messages from his own. Working undercover, he handled moderation and support tasks and received roughly $1,000 per week in bitcoins from Dread Pirate Roberts, or DPR. He described DPR as directing staff and granting access. The court instructed jurors to disregard his answer about what a PGP signature assured and struck an answer about DPR’s awareness of illegal drug sales.
Turning to October 1, 2013, Der-Yeghiayan explained a conditional plan: if Ross Ulbricht was DPR, investigators hoped to obtain an open computer displaying the same chat the agent was conducting. He testified that DPR remained offline while he watched Ulbricht enter Cafe Bello and then Glen Park library, returning online shortly afterward. Der-Yeghiayan initiated a chat, requested a check of flagged messages to prompt an administrator login, and later signaled Chris Tarbell after interpreting a reply as indicating access to that page.
Outside the jury’s presence, the court addressed repeated authentication and hearsay objections. It admitted narcotics listings for their truth under the coconspirator exception but stressed that its evidentiary findings were not ultimate findings about any conspiracy. Certain forum exhibits were admitted only to show what was written. The court also emphasized that the DPR connection remained subject to later evidence and maintained its business-record ruling on the current record, leaving room to revisit indications of unreliability.