[graedus]

She retained the money.

And then I called the wire transfer company and placed a stop on the payment.

It's unclear to me how this works. At first, it seems as though she and Anthony pursued this action independently, which would seem quite risky: risk of the apparently-fraudulent stop payment not being processed in time, or at all, resulting in the loss of 30k; risk of legal action from the seller, however seemingly ridiculous and unlikely, is scary. Later it sounds like maybe this was done with the FBI's blessing (point 5 under "Here's what to do").

[akcreek]

I (Anthony from the story) negotiated the price with the seller to $3,500. I had Jordan wire that to escrow.com while we waited for the domain, db and files to be transferred. We made this decision because nobody was helping (hosts/law enforcement) and with this action the worst case scenario became paying $3,500 for the site (assuming the seller didn't back out). After this the FBI took the case and they were involved in stopping the funds from transferring.

I'm positive she would have gotten it back eventually even if it did sell to someone else and they took control, but it could have been a more lengthy process and her entire living is derived from the website and the business associated with it. Having it out of her control for any amount of time could have been very damaging.

I had a Flippa account with history and no visible connection to her so the seller did not know that I was working with the actual site owner and she was working with the FBI.

The investigation is still ongoing and I've had some interesting conversations with the seller (thief is more accurate) since the money was frozen.

[gamebak]

I sent you an email to your inbox mentioned in your user profile. Someone tried to sell me that website as well and I did some research about him (got his skype, his email, and even his address ).

[akcreek]

Thanks for reaching out - just sent you an email back.

[quackerhacker]

Glad it was $3,500 as opposed to $30k....hope she gets it back! Would love to hear some back and forth between you and douche, I hope you post a blog!

[akcreek]

We exchanged 47 emails from the 24th to the 28th. If I can grab some time I'll put a different kind of post together... more about the interactions, which were very up and down with this guy. I don't write a blog or anything so not sure where I'd post it though.

[quackerhacker]

I don’t have my money back yet, but the man who stole my site from me doesn’t have it, either, and won’t be getting it, ever.

I don't think she got her money back, it may be held, but the method in which she got her domain back involved money transfer. The FBI, was really just sprinkled in the article. I understand the shock in how they handled the case immediately taking statements, but the resolution she had involved her money to get her domain back.