People are well within their right to believe he is guilty without waiting for a trial. People are well within their right to continue to believe he is guilty even if he is found not guilty - the standards of evidence and requirements to find someone guilty in a court of law are on purpose stringent on the basis that it is worse to imprison someone unjustly than let some criminals go free.
There's a vast gap from believing someone is guilty without waiting for a trial, to advocating the repeal of the rule of law.
As for your statement unless someone has presented evidence and accusations founded in something more than thin air, your example is not in any way equivalent.
But the evidence and accusations are founded on nothing more than thin air until they are proven in a court of law. If we presume guilt until innocence - why even bother with a criminal justice system? Should we just revert to stoning people on the presumption of guilt?
While, yes, folks are free to assume guilt of others, it's an abominable thing to do, as all it does is play straight into the hands of those who would control criminal justice through their media mouthpieces.
No, they're based upon a detailed explanation of the evidence of the state, given to a Grand Jury, who determines whether there is sufficient evidence to proceed to trial. That document is available publicly as an indictment.
Some indictments are bogus, some are solid. This one is solid. Also, since we're not lynching anybody that makes us at least slightly better than a lynch mob.
(P.S. we need a law like Godwin's for lynch mob references.)
> If we presume guilt until innocence - why even bother with a criminal justice system?
Someone believing he is guilty outside a court of law does not cause him to get thrown in prison. That is why we bother with a criminal justice system, with specific standards.
> it's an abominable thing to do
It's the human thing to do. We all do it. You too, no matter how much you may want to pretend you don't judge. It is a fine thing to try to withhold judgement, but we are not even capable of fully preventing it.
In fact, you are expressing a great deal of judgement about people on the basis of lack of evidence in this very thread:
> It makes you no better than a lynch mob.
If you seriously don't see the difference between holding a belief, without making any statement about how certain you are that it is correct, and going out with the intent of subjecting someone to violence on the basis of that belief, then you seriously need to think through your thought process.
An indictment is handed down by a grand jury of ordinary people based on the presentation of facts. It's not just an accusation lobbed on the internet. Court systems should presume innocent until guilt is proven, but bystanders on the internet are totally allowed to speculate based on their gut feelings.
In most jurisdictions the prosecutor entirely controls whether someone is indicted. The prosecutor has the sole ability to present fact and evidence to the grand jury. There is no defense attorney allowed to speak. Thus the common saying amoung prosecutors that they could "indict a ham sandwich for the murder of a pig."
But while the act of being indicted means very little the evidence it forces the prosecution to produce is essential to the defendant.
The documentation produced by the indictment contains testimony, evidence, and large portions of the investigation. It's almost always the defense's first target of attack. However, in this case, it appears very solid for the prosecution.
If I were Ulbricht, I would hammer at the potential Fourth Amendment violation. It is still unclear how the FBI located and imaged Silk Road's servers.
He's put filed motions, but his lawyers never did the investigatory legwork needed to win. Winning such a motion requires a very tight focus on the particularities of the case, and so one can see the smallest of violations, like tiny pinpricks of sun through a brick wall. Then you take one of these pinpricks, and you turn it into a defense.
I would ask, in no particular order:
How exactly did the the FBI get the images of the Silk Road servers?
What is the timeline of the various events in the investigation leading up to Ubricht's arrest?
Did the gmail screen name lead them to the Stack Overflow post which led to the MLAT, which led to the server?
Or did this, as they said later, somehow "expose" the Silk Road IP, and back track the rest of the evidence.
Were any other intelligence agencies involved?
Was any form of backbone collection use to reveal the SR IP?
Mainly I would do this, because if he doesn't win a Fourth Amendment motion to dismiss he's going to jail for a very very long time.
How do you know what a child molester looks like? Have you seen many of them? Are you friends with them? Your comment is highly suspicious, I think we better take you in for questioning.
In that case, you, sir, are a child molester, until you prove to me that you are not.