Jerome Bannister saw them before they saw him. They were sitting in a Honda Accord near the exit of the strip mall. He couldn’t tell their race, or their age but he knew who they were: feds.

The short story was posted in two parts to /r/darknetmarkets last month, a tale of a former medical student turning to the drug trade to pay off student loans. Nominally fiction, the story showed a surprising knowledge of the trade, going into detail on Jerome’s VPN setup for buying heroin online, as well as his habit of wearing latex gloves when he mailed a package.

The author was right about one other thing: by the time the story was posted, the Feds were already closing in.

Last week, police announced the arrest of…

Continue reading…