Adam Bunger, a Kentucky man arrested last week for selling firearms on the Deep Web, has been linked by police to a second online account where he allegedly traded in stolen credit cards and PayPal accounts, fake IDs, narcotics, and silver bullion.
Assistant US attorney Jo Lawless said Bunger can expect to face a host of new charges in the near future.
The Daily Dot reported extensively on the links between Bunger and the two accounts last week, connections that police were apparently making, too.
“He has no serious criminal history, but, man, he has gone from 0 to 100,” assistant US attorney Jo Lawless told Judge Brent Brennenstuhl, according to a report in the Park City Daily News. “… It’s a little mind-boggling. He’s involved in a level of criminality that we do not often see here.”
Bunger’s global firearm dealing operation first came to the attention of authorities in July when a Modelo Super 9mm pistol shipped to Australia was intercepted. The gun was disassembled and unsuccessfully hidden inside a broken Xbox, according to the criminal complaint. The customer to whom the gun was addressed admitted that the purchase was made on Black Market Reloaded, an anonymous Deep Web bazaar famous for its weapons department.
The package was traced back to Bowling Green, Kentucky where a postal clerk eventually identified Bunger as the sender. Two additional illegal firearm shipments to Sweden and the United Kingdom were intercepted from the same post office. Federal agents used credit card records to link Bunger to the mailings. He was then picked out from photo spreads by multiple mail clerks, reported the Smoking Gun.
The original criminal complaint indicated that police were unaware that Bunger operated multiple Deep Web businesses in addition to dealing firearms. However, the connections between Bunger and multiple accounts on the Deep Web did not escape Black Market Reloaded users last week, as they publicly connected Bunger to multiple illegal online operations. Users and staff linked Bunger to accounts Grass4Cash, which he used to sell weapons, and demonfifa, which he used mostly to sell stolen credit cards.
Further investigation showed that the demonfifa account made around 1,000 sales of stolen credit cards, stolen identities, hacked Paypal accounts, fake IDs, marijuana, mushrooms, and silver bullion. At the time of Bunger’s arrest, the account was making about 100 total sales per month.
If the police were initially unaware, they caught on by the time of Bunger’s bail hearing last Friday. Moderators at Black Market Reloaded have since deleted all discussions explicitly relating to Bunger and the two accounts many suspect him of operation. It seems like the deletions are too little, too late.
“There are hints from every article when compare to G4C [Grass4Cash’s] activity that show LEO [law enforcement officers] do not know scope of his activity,” wrote fellow gun salesman lereyjenkins last week. “It best we all STFU before they get more shit on him.”
At the bail hearing, the defense said that Bunger had not been definitively linked to both accounts.
“I don’t think that’s enough to keep him in custody based on speculation when we don’t know if it’s the same person writing these messages,” said Laura Wyrosdick, Bunger’s court-appointed lawyer.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Brent Brennenstuhl released Bunger on a $25,000 unsecured bond under his mother’s custody. Bunger is forbidden from accessing the Internet while out on bail.
Photo by murdelta/Flickr
