Woman jailed after RentaHitman.com assassin turned out to be – surprise – FBI

[kristjansson]

> She also told the undercover g-man that her real name was Zandra Ellis, confirmed she wanted BH killed, paid him $100 for the hit, and agreed to pay the remaining balance in $250 installments every two weeks

This person really tried to put a hit on layaway.

[wavemode]

It's a good business model. Noone would dare default on such a loan.

[p1mrx]

> This person really tried to put a hit on layaway.

Layaway would mean $100 for kidnapping and $900 later to close the contract. Sounds like a deal until you get the bill for room and board.

[tastyfreeze]

If you can't pay for a hit in one payment, maybe try DIY instead of a payment plan to save some dough.

[mdrzn]

They should've integrated Klarna

[jasonhansel]

Unfortunately, the fake hitman site has been shut down, apparently due to financial difficulties: https://rentahitman.com/

[lakpan]

It looks like their form submission handler is being annoying, probably because it was being asked to store a database of murder requests.

In the day of free static hosting and insane amounts of otherwise free computing power, it's hard to believe it's "financially difficult" to serve web page and store what probably is a form submission per week at most.

Also from the website:

> I have purposefully refrained from accepting funds from any source to avoid any misinterpretation.

and in the next paragraph:

> [if you] feel inclined to contribute, you can do so by clicking the SUPPORT link

Guy's weird.

[LoganDark]

> This website uses yummy cookies.

ZAHFjkdahflkasd

> We are 100% HIPPA Compliant

sdajfkghlkhgfjhlgasldhjkfgblhj

(this website is a meme, who would ever believe it??)

[neom]

Couple of interviews with the Rent a Hitman webmaster:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DiPajuyET1w

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYBCuU1C1xg

And fun short doc by wavy websurf:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHDWi4EEW2c

[chii]

At what point would it be considered entrapment to have law enforcement run these honeypots?

[pilif]

According to the article, in this case it was a (pretty obvious) parody website and the webmaster called law enforcement on their own.

[Kamq]

If the government agency running the honeypot went out and started badgering people into contracting hits. That would be entrapment, according to my understanding.

[jasonhansel]

It's only entrapment if you wouldn't have committed the crime otherwise. I think it's safe to say that, had Rentahitman.com not existed, she would still have tried to rent a hitman if she were able to do so.

[Duwensatzaj]

Probably never. Entrapment in US law is when the government creates the crime. Offering up the opportunity doesn’t create it, just catch those looking.

Maybe if they started heavily advertising it, sending spam to the same person continuously for months on end.

Even if an undercover cop asked you to hire a hitman and you say yes. Entrapment is more when you say “No” and the government agent keeps on begging you until you give in.

[roshin]

I recall a story of a young police woman who enticed an autistic highschool guy to buy drugs. He was arrested for that. If that's not entrapment, I don't know what is.

[xboxnolifes]

At minimum, I'd expect that law enforcement would have to put significant amounts of advertisements of the services, along with persuasion to use them, for it to be considered entrapment. Just offering the service is not entrapment. There needs to be incitement.

[mc32]

It's not run by law enforcement. It's an individual who gets lots of "leads" most are obvious pranks --but he occasionally gets live ones. He forwards those on to local law enforcement, other times the FBI.

[gnopgnip]

It is only entrapment when the government induces a normally law abiding person to commit a crime, generally with harassment or threats or other overbearing behavior.

[smegsicle]

something about working to convince someone that breaking the law is a good idea

[steve_adams_86]

I guess I better be more careful about the websites I use to find hitmen!

[fbdab103]

Sounds like a market exists for a hire-a-hitman review site. Some kind of guarantees on how many of the agents my be feds.

[jfghi]

Only 18 months?

[epicureanideal]

Gender disparities in sentencing is a statistically well documented issue.

[merpnderp]

Yeah I’m in awe that attempted murder only gets you 18 months at the federal level. For some reason we’ve decided that murder and attempted murder just aren’t that big a deal anymore.

[tumsfestival]

Not the first idiot that falls for this website. If it were kids, I might forgive the ignorance and lack of common sense, but how are fully grown adults this naive and oblivious? It always boggles my mind.

[red-iron-pine]

like all things, it's a bellcurve. and it's a big curve. by definition 50% are dumber than the median.

and now remember that most of these people have cell phones and can post on the internet. and vote.

[Miserlou57]

We need a more anonymous site for this. Hitmonchan.

[COAGULOPATH]

Has anyone ever hired a hitman WITHOUT it being an undercover agent?

[defrost]

Sure.

The instances we know for certain about are on FBI recordings of organised crime meeting places and in the details confirmed confessionals of assassin plea deals.

It seems reasonable to conclude there are non-LEO assassins for hire that haven't yet been caught or recorded.

[chriscjcj]

I suppose it has happened, but I agree with the point you're making. Unless you're really connected and know exactly WTF you're doing, there's probably about a 99.99% chance that the hitman you've hired will be an undercover agent.

[dgrin91]

A few years back there was a hilarious case of a guy who hired a hitman, and that hitman subcontracted to someone else... who did the same.... who did the same... x5. In the end the last guy was so cheap & bad that he got caught and the whole chain went down.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2019/10/25/chinese...

[CamperBob2]

There's a famous instance in Seattle: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Wales

[sersi]

In 2003, in Hong Kong, see https://www.scmp.com/article/399304/diners-flee-teahouse-exe...

[paulpauper]

i am sure many have. the hitman simply runs off with the $

[chriscjcj]

Does fruit hang any lower than this?

[sdevlimbo]

What are the chances that the website is a honeypot?

[hyperhopper]

Please don't comment without reading the article. The article clearly states it is not a real website intended to actually connect killers with clients.