Former police officer Tom Booker had thousands of sales on dark web markets including The Whitehouse Market
Thousands of sales and $1.5m in profits – we look inside the dark web business run from an Adelaide apartment by a former cop, whose moral compass steered him away from meth and heroin.
Police & Courts
Don't miss out on the headlines from Police & Courts. Followed categories will be added to My News.
A former police officer used the dark web to make thousands of sales online and net more than $1.5m in profits while shipping drugs around Australia, court documents reveal.
However, his letter of apology to the court said while his moral compass steered him away from selling methamphetamine and heroin, he became blinded by greed and the detachment of selling drugs online.
Thomas Booker, 28, has pleaded guilty to dozens of drug charges stemming from Underlinecost – an online drug business with a presence on multiple dark web marketplaces.
Booker ran the website from his Adelaide apartment and the house of a co-accused who has pleaded guilty to being a subordinate in the business venture.
The investigation into Underlinecost showed evidence of posts advertising drugs on dark web forums from as early as 2019.
Booker was posting adverts on Dread, a dark web discussion forum which has been known to feature instructions for making illegal drugs and to facilitate the sale of stolen data.
Officers were able to locate profiles on three well known dark web sites which served as online “eBay like” marketplaces for illegal substances.
Underlinecost advertised on Whitehouse Market, a go-to location on the dark web for drug purchases and stolen personal data.
Booker’s online profile on the site showed he was selling LSD, steroids, valium and cocaine and had 2140 previous sales listed.
Whitehouse Market was shut down in October 2021, putting a dent in the dark market sale of illicit substances.
Police also discovered that Underlinecost had an account on ToRReZ Market, a similar dark web site where the user page showed there had been 1504 sales of drugs including cocaine and LSD.
Underlinecost also advertised and sold drugs on Dark0de Market which bills itself as an international, all-purpose dark web site.
Booker posted adverts for direct sales on various forums, bypassing any commission which might need to be paid to a dark web marketplace.
He used encrypted apps Wickr and Signal to communicate with potential buyers to sell them drugs.
The sales, both direct and over the marketplaces, would use cryptocurrencies including Monero, a specially designed privacy coin used predominantly in illegal transactions.
Booker’s operation started to come apart when a shipment of 8000 California Sunshine LSD tabs were seized by Australian Border Force officials en route to Adelaide from Luxembourg.
The package was addressed to “Daniel Sullivan” at an address in Marsden.
Police then seized security camera footage of Booker arriving to pick up the package.
Undercover operatives began purchasing drugs from Underlinecost through both the dark web marketplaces and direct sales.
From July to November 2021 undercover police purchased increasingly large amounts of drugs from Booker – culminating in the purcashe of 100 LSD tabs and one gram cocaine for $1255.
On November, 2021, police raided two addresses in Adelaide. In one house Booker and co-accused Ryan Suri-Tucker were found packaging drugs for sale with open ledgers in front of them.
On the table was 1.7kg of cannabis, more than 30 grams of cocaine and almost 300 LSD tabs.
In Booker’s home police found $340,145 in cash, a silver ingot and a key to a safety deposit box.
In the box was $460,300 in cash.
Officers also seized $717,953 in Bitcoin and Monero from several online crypto wallets.
In an apology letter written to the court Booker said his life had spiralled out of control when he was arrested.
“I was hiding my offending behind a computer screen and by using the postal system,” he said.
“I wasn’t meeting my victims or seeing the harm I was causing.
“I had the idea in my mind that by not using violence and refusing to sell heroin or methamphetamine that I was somehow doing less harm but I can see now how wrong I was.
“I am now witnessing first hand just how much harm all drugs cause.”
Booker and Suri-Tucker will be sentenced next month.
‘You killed my mother’: Mourning family confront elderly killer driver
The “heartbroken” and “traumatised family” of a beloved mother and grandmother killed in a collision have confronted her killer in court.
Read more
Jimmy’s dad learns fate for servo robbery after brother’s ‘betrayal’
The father was in custody for robbing service stations when his brother committed the ultimate betrayal before allegedly harming his young son, a court heard.
Read more