RentAHitman.com
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Founded | 2005 |
---|---|
Headquarters | Northern California |
Country of origin | United States |
Founder(s) | Bob Innes |
URL | https://rentahitman.com/ |
RentAHitman.com is a satirical
Afterwards, Innes converted RentAHitman.com to a supposed front for a contract killing agency, though he included numerous jokes in its content to clearly signal the site is a parody. Despite this, Innes' site has resulted in several further convictions for those attempting to employ the supposed services, as he checks messages sent to him and refers any serious requests to law enforcement agencies.[3]
Origin
RentAHitman.com was bought and registered by Bob Innes of Northern California on February 5, 2005, for US$9.20.
Creation of site
Innes checked the email inbox he had associated with the website in 2008 and found he had 250–300 messages requesting the services of
After this case Innes decided to continue to run the website and to rebrand it as a fake contract killing agency.
Innes received around 8–10 requests a month, for a total of around 700 by November 2021, including 400 via his service request form.[4] He removes obvious joke entries but replies to any enquiries that he considers to be serious.[4] He allows clients a 24 hour cooling off period after which he asks two questions: "Do you still require our services? And would you like me to place you in contact with a field operative for a free consultation?". If they reply in the affirmative he passes their details onto law enforcement.[6] Innes passes all requests involving minors to the police immediately.[5] Innes considers the site "a magnet for low-hanging fruit that are out there trying to harm other people" and said "I really didn’t think that people were gonna be that stupid. Boy, did they show me".[4][5] He covers all costs to keep the site running, though he accepts donations.[6] After receiving several emails from people who wished to be hired as hitmen, Innes added a "Careers" page to the website, with a fake employment application.[7]
Prosecutions
Innes thinks around 10% of enquiries to the site result in a police investigation and considers that he has saved around 150 lives through the site.[6][8] For a time, Innes received a lot of enquiries from Indonesia as a result of his site being mentioned in an Indonesian YouTube video about the dark web.[5] Innes thinks that around a dozen people have been arrested as a result of the website. There have been at least a few notable cases.[5][9]
References
- ^ Baker, KC. "A Website Called 'RentAHitman.com' Is a Parody — But It Lures Actual People Who Want to Kill". People. Retrieved 25 August 2023.
- ^ News on hire a hitman services - Wetwork on onion, retrieved 2024-01-02
- ^ How This Joke Website Puts Criminals In Jail, retrieved 2023-08-12
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Edwards, Jonathan (22 November 2021). "A Michigan woman tried to hire an assassin online at RentAHitman.com. Now, she's going to prison". Washington Post. Retrieved 5 January 2022.
- ^ a b c d e f g h Dickson, E. J. (15 October 2020). "How a Fake Rent-a-Hitman Site Became an Accidental Murder-for-Hire Sting Operation". Rolling Stone.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Salam, Erum (17 December 2021). "Meet the man who accidentally started an assassin hiring website". The Guardian. Retrieved 5 January 2022.
- ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved April 15, 2023.
- ^ Kreutz, Liz (27 November 2021). "How Bay Area man's 'Rent-a-Hitman' site is leading to arrests and saving lives". ABC7 San Francisco. Retrieved 5 January 2022.
- ^ Clark, Nathan (14 January 2022). "Woman sentenced for trying to hire fake hitman service". Mlive.com. Retrieved 15 January 2022.