He was sentenced to life imprisonment for creating and operating the platform. However, similar platforms like DeepBay, Sheep Marketplace, RAMP, and Black Market Reloaded are still operational on the dark web. It is the part of the internet where you cannot access web pages and domains with a regular search engine. Also, for extra security, having a reliable VPN like NordVPN is a wise decision. The dark web is a paradoxical corner of the internet where intrigue and danger coexist. It is a shadowy place with everything from illicit goods to clandestine chat rooms, stolen identities, whistleblowers, academic papers, and more.
- The Pences considered the text a straightforward account of history, and every morning, before sunrise, Christopher led the family in studying Scripture.
- Everything was urgent, and in the depths of the pandemic lockdown, with no distractions, the Kill List became all-consuming.
- There has never been a murder definitively attributed to dark-web hitmen.
- Allwine told police he’d spent the morning working in his basement.
- On Christopher’s back, in a baby carrier, is the youngest Cordero child, his face fixed in an observant gaze.
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So, there you have it – the truth about hitmen on the Dark Web. While the Dark Web is undoubtedly a mysterious and intriguing place, the myth of hitman-for-hire services is likely just that – a myth. It’s a mix of scams, law enforcement tactics, and sensationalized tales that spread like wildfire on the internet. Reading page after page of detailed instructions of exactly how and where a target should be murdered, it was clear that many of the customers were deadly serious. Our fear was that one of them would find a real hitman, or take matters into their own hands. The website attracted customers from every corner of the world.
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These individuals typically operate anonymously and use sophisticated encryption and other security measures to avoid detection. Yura devoted a lot of energy to defending the website’s credibility. A California-based person going by name Thcjohn2 had written to the website offering his services as an assassin. “I am broke (of course), and am looking for quick cash,” Thcjohn2 wrote. “I have military training (US Navy).” Instead of taking him up on his offer, Yura had asked Thcjohn2 to make videos of burning cars to intimidate Monteiro and other critics.
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On July 27, 2023, she transferred approximately 0.358 BTC ($10,510) to a Bitcoin wallet she believed belonged to the murder-for-hire recipient. Bottom line, reaching a hitman takes a bit of work to cover your tracks, but you do need to do it. Get an anonymous digital wallet and make sure you tumble your coins. The researchers pointed out that, despite being covered in trust-signals, all of the sites just felt untrustworthy.
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To pay for the murder, Zhou contracted with a Bitcoin exchange service in Ukraine to make a $5,000 payment in Bitcoin on her behalf. She provided approximately $5,000 in cash to a middleman in Brooklyn and then communicated with the website administrator to confirm payment. After sending payment, Zhou provided a detailed description of the woman and her home, her work schedule, and the best times to target her, so the woman’s husband would have an alibi for the murder.
- Instead, the administrators would make up excuses for why the murder hadn’t been carried out—the hitman got lost, or the victim was too well protected—before the customer finally gave up.
- The incriminating evidence against Stephen Allwine was growing.
- We were able to find follow-up articles on these cases in which local gang-members were arrested.
- Then, since such services will come with a hefty price tag, you need to ensure you’ve done your homework to avoid getting scammed.
- We asked him about the sites he created on the regular internet to advertise Yura’s sites on the dark web.
“We use ricin in most of our jobs and due to its nature which does not raise a lot of suspicion,” the representative said. Samwel added that Bryan’s computer, camera and two phones had vanished, which is strange, as Bryan – a small-time Instagram and YouTube celebrity – was inseparable from his devices. He also mentioned that his son had a $400,000 life insurance policy; Njoroge had changed the beneficiary – designating a female friend instead of his parents – just a month before dying. Monteiro claims that the officers said they would be in touch again for an information handover, but did not ask him to show them the data he had brought to the meeting, which was on his laptop. The only document they consulted was an A3 printout on which Monteiro had summarised the intricacies of Besa Mafia’s operation. But, elsewhere, someone called Chris Monteiro has been disrupting the website’s operations for years, triggering its admin’s wrath.
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In court, prosecutors pointed to a series of affairs – and the fact that Stephen was the only beneficiary of Amy’s $700,000 life insurance policy – as probable motives. Allwine was found guilty and sentenced to life in prison in February 2018. On May 31, 2016, about a month after the bRspd leak, the FBI contacted Amy Allwine, a woman living at the Minnesota address Dogdaygod had submitted to Besa Mafia. Amy and her husband Stephen Allwine – an IT specialist and a deacon at a local church – met with officers who informed them that someone had paid at least $6,000 on the dark web to murder Amy.
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And a month later, he was sentenced to three years in state prison. “48 Hours” also tipped off detective Michael Ulrey in Clarksville, Tennessee, who broke the news to then 22-year-old Sydney Minor, a single mom. The elusive Yura never showed up, claiming we could have been followed by police. Then, for some reason, about a week later he upgraded his order from kidnapping to “I would just like this person dead.” A few months later, when she told him she had a new boyfriend, she says he became angry.
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During his investigation, Miller also reached out to potential victims to tell them their private information — including workplace addresses and photographs — had been posted online. Even if a hitman-for-hire website turns out to be fake, the consequences for attempting to use it are very real. Chris Monteiro says Yura knows there will always be people who believe his sites are authentic, people who expect him to deliver death when they click for a killer. So he remains in business, somewhere out there … on the dark web. Either way, the most dangerous thing about him may be his customers — some so driven to kill that if Yura doesn’t get the job done, they might do it themselves … like prosecutors allege about Steven Allwine.
Under false names, the website’s users complete a form to request a murder. They throw hundreds of bitcoins into the website’s digital purse. The Times reports that a hitman-for-hire website set up on the dark web is estimated to have taken more than £400,000 from individuals who have ordered the deaths of about 175 innocent people.
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The entire family, along with Christopher’s retired parents, lived in a 5,800-square-foot home on the northern edge of the Mojave Desert, surrounded by wind-raked brushland and snow-capped mountains in all directions. They were building greenhouses on the property and had plans to buy cows. One weekday in the summer of 2021, Christopher Pence entered his home office in Cedar City, Utah, and plugged a USB stick into his computer. He booted up Tails, an operating system designed to optimize privacy, and used it to access the dark web — a marketplace teeming with illicit goods and services like child pornography, weapons, and drugs.
This time, the person who allegedly hired the hit man is a woman living near Chicago. A law enforcement source told “48 Hours,” “there is no evidence at this time that Mrs. Alexis States was involved.” But just hours after notifying Sydney, Clarksville, Tenn., police informed the Army about “48 Hours”‘ tip. The next day, in Korea, Brandon States was charged with several military violations, including an attempt of premeditated murder. Some days, Jane Sharpe mourns the loss of her friend, Amy Allwine, by blowing off steam at the gym. Prosecutors believe Amy’s husband shot her in cold blood after his attempt to hire a hit man failed.
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The Dark Web is part of the unindexed section of the Deep Web, which makes up a significant portion of the internet. The Dark Web itself can be accessed through a special browser (TOR-The Onion Router) which bounces around IP addresses, constantly changing between layers, to protect anonymity. “Most people were stoic and calm during the calls,” said Miller. “It took them a while to let the message sink in. One of the women I spoke to was so unruffled by the news that she didn’t even change her plans for the evening. She went to see her friend who lives right next to her estranged husband. “It’s very unusual to step out of a normal role as a journalist,” said Miller. “There was a case in the U.K., a love triangle,” he explained.
