The creator of Silk Road will be sentenced on Friday for his role in setting up the drugs marketplace, on which it is thought $200m worth of drug sales took place.
The ruling will come after Ross Ulbricht, a 31-year-old American, was found guilty of conspiracy to commit drug trafficking, money laundering and computer hacking, among other things, in New York in February.
Under mandatory sentencing laws the former physics student must face a minimum of 20 years, but federal prosecutors are urging the district judge Katherine Forrest to give a verdict "substantially above" that baseline, which could mean a life sentence.
Whilst Ulbricht has admitted that he started Silk Road in 2011, he maintains that he handed it over to others but was lured back as a "fall guy" before the site was first shut down at the end of 2013.
Users of the market could ensure their anonymity throughout the process by using the Tor network, which uses a relay system to prevent its users being tracked, and the cryptocurrency Bitcoin, which can be bought and sold anonymously.
The US government maintains that the black market generated $213m (£140m) in revenue, and alleged that Ulbricht took a commission from the trades in Bitcoin.
By infiltrating the admin group that ran Silk Road American police were able to shut down the website towards the end of 2013 and 2014, with the first strike leading to Ulbricht’s arrest.
In addition to the charges he has already been convicted on Ulbricht was also accused by prosecutors of attempting to organise an assassination on someone he believed would jeopardise the site’s future – though it is not believed these murders were carried out.
Prosecutors relied on personal journals and Ulbricht’s Bitcoin wallet to secure the convictions, with the case intended to send a message to dark web users that they are not immune from the US law.
However it emerged in March that two US special agents had been charged with stealing Bitcoins while investigating Silk Road, in cases that remain ongoing.
Ulbricht’s lawyer declined to comment ahead of sentencing, though the defence is expected to appeal the conviction.
