A 33-year-old Slovakian man has admitted to his role in running Kingdom Market, a darknet marketplace that facilitated the sale of narcotics and stolen personal data.
Alan Bill of Bratislava entered a guilty plea Tuesday in U.S. District Court in St. Louis to one count of conspiracy to distribute controlled substances.
Kingdom Market operated from March 2021 until its takedown in December 2023. The platform enabled users to buy and sell illicit goods through cryptocurrency transactions, including:
▪️Fentanyl and methamphetamine
▪️Stolen financial information
▪️Fraudulent identification documents
Bill admitted to providing web administration services for the marketplace, receiving cryptocurrency payments from Kingdom-associated wallets, and managing the market's presence on platforms like Reddit and Dread.
Federal investigators conducted undercover purchases from Kingdom beginning in July 2022, obtaining fentanyl, methamphetamine, and a U.S. passport shipped to Missouri.
Bill was arrested on December 15, 2023, at Newark Liberty International Airport. A customs inspection uncovered two phones, a laptop, a thumb drive, and a hardware cryptocurrency wallet containing evidence linking him to Kingdom's operations.
As part of his plea agreement, Bill agreed to forfeit cryptocurrency holdings across five different coins. Authorities seized the Kingdommarket[.]live and Kingdommarket[.]so domains during the December 2023 takedown.
Sentencing is scheduled for May 5. The conspiracy charge carries a mandatory minimum of five years in federal prison, with a maximum of 40 years and fines up to $5 million.
