How did they locate him?
I know I should watch the documentaries, but I never get enough time for that.
In the end the fatal fact was the silly git leaving a post with [email protected] on this here very forum. https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.568744 I think he deleted the original post but it was quoted by someone else. Now it's archival. It was found by a bog standard google search.
This is his account on here - https://bitcointalksearch.org/user/altoid-3905 and the same account made the first ever mention of Silk Road anywhere. He deleted that post too but it's quoted here - https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.43039
For some reason no one had looked into it even though they'd been looking for DPR for a year or two by then.
There's a pretty rapid summary here but of course there was a fair bit more leading up to it - https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/01/the-incredibly-simple-story-of-how-the-govt-googled-ross-ulbricht/
They already had other details about DPR and once they started to look at Ross's internet footprint they converged enough to go after him.
Damn.
That was a really rookie mistake, and they took quite long to figure out something you could easily google.
Thanks for the summary.