Slovakian Administrator of Darknet Market that Sold Drugs and Stolen Personal Information Sentenced to 200 Months in Prison

ST. LOUIS - U.S. District Judge Cristian M. Stevens on Thursday sentenced a Slovakian man who aided the operation of a darknet market to 200 months in prison.

Alan Bill, 33, of Bratislava, pleaded guilty in January to one felony count of conspiracy to distribute controlled substances and admitted involvement in the operation of Kingdom Market, a darknet marketplace that operated between March 2021 and December 2023. Kingdom facilitated thousands of transactions wherein hundreds of vendors offered dangerous illegal drugs, stolen financial information, fraudulent identification documents, counterfeit currencies and computer malware throughout the world. Buyers made their purchases via cryptocurrency and anonymous or semi-anonymous accounts.

As part of his plea, Bill admitted assisting others in maintaining or operating Kingdom by providing or procuring web-administration services. He also admitted receiving cryptocurrency from a wallet associated with Kingdom, assisting with the creation of Kingdom's forum pages on websites such as Reddit and Dread, having access to Kingdom usernames that made postings on behalf of Kingdom on social media accounts and communicating with others regarding certain Kingdom transactions.

Although Bill attempted to minimize his role with Kingdom Market in a day-long hearing Thursday, Judge Stevens found that evidence showed that Bill was a leader and/or organizer of the criminal conspiracy and was aware of what vendors were selling.

Kingdom servers show that there were more than 1,500 sales of heroin by dozens of vendors and nearly 600 sales of what sellers claimed was Oxycodone. Bill and his co-conspirators knew that fentanyl was being slipped into other products, a sentencing memo filed by the government says. "The dangerous drugs trafficked by defendant through Kingdom caused harm to untold numbers of people across the world," the memo says.

After announcing the sentence Thursday, Judge Stevens said, "It's hard to even imagine the amount of misery that the defendant's actions have caused."

Undercover federal investigators bought fentanyl, meth and a United States passport from Kingdom that were shipped to the Eastern District of Missouri. Bill was arrested Dec. 15, 2023, at Newark Liberty International Airport in possession of electronic devices that contained evidence of his involvement with Kingdom.

As part of his plea agreement, Bill also agreed to forfeit five different types of cryptocurrency, as well as the Kingdommarket.live and Kingdommarket.so domains, which have been shut down by authorities.

"Alan Bill helped run a darknet market that sold stolen identity and financial information, counterfeit currency and illegal drugs, including bogus prescription drugs containing fentanyl," said U.S. Attorney Thomas C. Albus. "This sentence should send a message that serious crimes will be punished harshly, no matter where they occur or how hidden they appear to be."

"Life is a series of good and bad choices. Mr. Bill made a bad choice to start a darknet marketplace that sold misery in the form of illegal drugs, stolen financial information and fake or stolen identification documents," said IRS-Criminal Investigation St. Louis Special Agent in Charge William Steenson. "IRS-CI is committed to using the financial expertise of our special agents to track down and stop criminal organizations such as Kingdom Market. We're grateful to our partners at the U.S. Attorney's Office for their aggressive prosecution of this case."

"Distributing deadly and highly addictive narcotics is extremely dangerous and has been a major contributor to the ongoing drug epidemic that is destroying communities across the country," said Acting Inspector in Charge, Nicholas Bucciarelli, who leads the Chicago Division of the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, which includes the St. Louis Domicile Office. "Leveraging USPIS unique cross-border authorities and expertise in cyber and narcotics investigations, Inspectors were able to pierce the veil of anonymity that these drug traffickers falsely believed they possessed by operating on the dark web, to expose their conspiracy and hold them accountable for their actions."

"People often feel a false sense of security and anonymity, like they're able to get away with something if they conduct business on the dark web," DEA St. Louis Field Division Special Agent in Charge Michael Davis said. "That couldn't be further from the truth. Our investigators and agents are well versed in the field of cyber transactions and work routinely to dismantle those organizations looking to profit off others with the sale of illegal drugs."

IRS Criminal Investigation, the FBI, Homeland Security Investigations, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, the Social Security Administration Office of Inspector General, the Bureau of Diplomatic Security and the Missouri Department of Revenue investigated the case. The investigation also involved numerous foreign law enforcement agencies, including the German Federal Criminal Police, or Bundeskriminalamt, the Frankfurt am Main Public Prosecutor's Office - Central Office for Combating Internet Crime (ZIT) as well as law enforcement agencies from Switzerland, the Republic of Moldova and Ukraine. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Kyle Bateman, John Ware and Justin Ladendorf prosecuted the case.