TheCommission Admits Selling Drugs on Empire Market
A California man admitted selling drugs through a vendor account on Empire Market.
Hunter Daniel Secrest, 27, of California, and known co-conspirators operated a darkweb vendor account with the username “TheCommission.” Secrest and his co-conspirators used the vendor profile to distribute a wide variety of drugs to customers on Empire Market, including heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine, and Xanax. The guilty plea, which allows for a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison, covered one count of conspiracy to distribute narcotics.
Secrest admitted to creating the vendor account on Empire Market in April 2020. Investigators from the Northern California Illicit Digital Economy (NCIDE) Task Force established that TheCommission had fulfilled more than 800 orders worth a total of more than $200,000 by June 2020.
Investigators arrested Secrest and his accomplices on June 27, 2020. They established that the defendants had sold or possessed with the intent to distribute a total of 752 grams of heroin, 45 grams of morphine, 11 grams of psilocybin mushrooms, 600 grams of cocaine, 277 grams of valium, 285 grams of alprazolam, 35 grams of Adderall, 1.6 kilograms of a substance with detectable amounts of fentanyl, and 93 grams of a substance with detectable amounts of methamphetamine.
On December 15, 2021, Secrest pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute narcotics. His sentencing hearing is set to take place before United States District Court Judge John A. Mendez on March 22, 2022. Secrest could be sentenced to a maximum of twenty years in prison and a $1 million fine.
