Flashy cars of ‘Darknet’ suspect up suspicions

Cazes’ death ‘serious blow’

BANGKOK, July 23, (AP): The neighbors had their suspicions.

The young Canadian accused of masterminding the world’s leading “darknet” internet marketplace lived a seemingly quiet life for more than a year with his Thai girlfriend in a middle-class neighborhood on the outskirts of Bangkok.

But the flashy cars he drove stood out.

There was the nearly $1 million, metallic gray Lamborghini. There was the Porsche, and then the Mini Cooper for his girlfriend. All in an area where people drive pickup trucks and children tool around on plastic tricycles.

The neighbors thought 25-year-old Alexandre Cazes worked in the hotel business. But according to the US Justice Department, he was the mastermind of AlphaBay, an internet marketplace that traded in illegal drugs, firearms and counterfeit goods.

By the time authorities closed in on July 5, Cazes had amassed a $23 million fortune as the site’s creator and administrator, court documents show.

On Thursday, US Justice Department officials gave details of the global police operation that brought down Cazes, who authorities say hanged himself in his Thai jail cell a week after his arrest, and dealt a serious blow to illicit internet commerce.

Cazes’ stepmother Kathy Gauthier expressed surprise at the allegations, saying “we do not understand how he could have been the person described by the FBI, that’s just not his personality!”

In a private Facebook message to The Associated Press, Gauthier wrote: “Alexandre was always a good boy without any kind of trouble in his past. He was peaceful and anti-drugs. We always thought his wealth came from investments in cryptocurrency, not from a ‘Darkmarket (sic).’”

She was apparently referring to “darknet.”

Cazes

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She continued: “He was raised in a good home by good parents, but now we are exhausted and simply want to accept the situation. Last week my spouse spoke to the media about who Alexandre really was, and our opinion hasn’t changed. Now we just want to move forward. And if what the FBI says is completely true, well, that’s not the Alexandre Cazes that we knew. but we would love him still, and forgive him.”

Interviews with Cazes’ neighbors paint a picture of a young man who displayed flashes of ostentation but otherwise seemed unassuming.

“He was with his girlfriend,” said a neighbor, Hassanupong Pootrakulchote. “Around New Year’s or Christmas I saw some of his friends come over and they would have a little party. There were Thai people, some of them were his girlfriend’s relatives ... Other than that it’s mostly quiet, nothing flashy or anything.”

Nothing except those expensive cars, which were completely out of place in the neighborhood where homes cost less than $120,000.

“Why does he have a Lamborghini? Why does he have a Porsche or Mini Cooper?” Hassanupong said. “There are recent news reports about people laundering money and that sort of thing. But like I said, I thought he was in the hotel business.”

Soon enough, talk in the neighborhood was that Cazes was ready to improve his standard of living.