A 41-Year-Old Man Sentenced For 18 Months for Selling Drugs on Darknet

A 41-year-old man from Bakersfield, Ramsey Jeries Farraj has been handed a prison sentence of 18 months for the sale of drugs on the Darknet.

According to the court, Farraj conspired with a partner in crime, Majed Bashir Akroush, 49 to structure $4 million of synthetic drugs.

Synthetic drug sale is a common trade on the Darknet market, and people seem to buy it despite its composition which can lead to sickness or even death.

According to the court, Haitham Eid Habash, 54 and Zaid Elodat, 30 were the suppliers of the drugs to Farraj, and he, in turn, sold the drugs to buyers through the Darknet marketplace.

They, therefore, opened an account in different banks to make $10,000 transaction to each of them. This was an attempt to avoid the filing of currency transaction reports.

Trading of drugs over the various part of the internet requires a bit of knowledge in Bitcoin which is capable of keeping buyers and sellers anonymous. Others even think that Bitcoin is mainly for Darknet. It is therefore likely that Faraj and his mates were paid in Bitcoin, and then exchanged the Bitcoin for an amount in their local currency.

Over $5 million from each of the bank accounts was seized as ordered by Dale A. Drozd, the U.S. District Judge. The court also seized a 1962 Chevrolet Impala, one Rolex watch, and seven properties.

The US has been prosecuting a lot of Darknet drug users lately, and this case for instance, is the outcome of an investigation conducted by several agencies listed: U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, the Internal Revenue Service-Criminal Investigation, and the California Highway Patrol, with assistance from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI); the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, the California Department of Motor Vehicles, the Kern County Probation, the Kern County Sheriff’s Office, the Bakersfield Police Department, and the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Office. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Karen A. Escobar, Grant B. Rabenn, and Jeffrey A. Spivak are prosecuting the cases.

The investigators have gone undercover on the Darknet, and have penetrated wider on the Network to trace the address provided on the platform to handcuff any suspect.

As part of the motive of these agencies, 12 search warrants were issued in Bakersfield and Los Angeles. Synthetic drugs worth over 1,000 pounds, about $500,000 in cash, and four firearms were discovered and seized by the authorities. Faraj and his accomplice, Akroush, Habash, and Elodat were therefore arrested according to the law.

Elodat pleaded guilty to the charges against him, whiles Akroush and Habash will appear before the court on September 25, Federal court in Fresno. This is one of the numerous drug related cases recorded in the United States of America.

Elodat and his accomplices face up to 20 years imprisonment and a fine of $1 million.

DRUG TRAFFICKING, A MAJOR ISSUE IN THE USA

The USA faces drug trafficking problem by which majority comes from the deep web. Elodat and his accomplices are part of the large drug trafficking group in the country that distributes drugs to the users on the street.

County, for instance, lamented over increasing drug cases in the first half of 2017. The sentence and the fine for arrested drug traffickers is a heavy one which is meant to discourage others from dealing in drugs.

The USA authorities seek to arrest more drug lords in the country. Their seriousness came to light when “cocaine cowboy” who had been on the run for 26 years was finally arrested. A massive fentanyl supplier was also busted by the DEA just recently, and this reveals the progress of the authorities.

The Drug Enforcement Agency, in an attempt to control the drug trafficking case makes over 30,000 arrests per annum related to sales and the distribution of drugs.

According to a statistics released, about 32% of all prison inmates in the United States of America, were either in possession of drugs or under the influence of drugs at the time of their arrests.

Drugs mostly penetrate into the country through the 2,000 miles land border between the USA and the Mexico.

The authorities in an attempt to eradicate this problem have collaborated with other external agencies to shut down the platform where the drugs originate. Attention has now been turned into the street, and this is the cause of the arrest of the Bakersfield’s man and other notable drug traffickers.