Melody Sasser (Facebook)
A 47-year-old woman in Tennessee has been indicted for allegedly trying to hire a hitman from the dark web to kill the wife of a man she met on Match.com.
A federal grand jury returned a one-count indictment against Melody Sasser, 47, for use of interstate commerce facilities in the commission of murder-for-hire, prosecutors said on Wednesday.
Sasser’s attorney, M. Jeffrey Whitt, didn’t immediately reply to an email to his office from Law&Crime on Saturday, but he told The Daily Beast he has recently been retained as her attorney.
“I have been representing citizens accused of crimes for 32 years across this state, and this is certainly not the first prosecution I’ve faced alleging some type of murder-for-hire scheme,” Whitt said in a statement provided to The Daily Beast. “Our investigation is in its infancy as I was only retained within the last week. As such, I find it premature to comment on the facts of this case until such time as each of the allegations have been vetted, and such future responses are in accordance with our state rules restricting public comments during pending prosecutions.”
In a federal criminal complaint, authorities allege it all went down between Dec. 31, 2022, to April, when Sasser allegedly contacted a now-defunct dark website, Online Killers Market (OKM), to hire a hitman to murder an Alabama resident, according to a complaint outlining the case.
In her communications with the site, Sasser allegedly provided photos and the victim’s location. Sasser paid nearly $10,000 in Bitcoin to the site administrators to purchase the services of a hitman, prosecutors allege.
Authorities were tipped to the murder-for-hire plot in April after they received information from a foreign law enforcement agency that the unidentified person, whose name is redacted in the complaint, was named as a target for a murder-for-hire.
The information provided contained messages between a user and an OKM site administrator. OKM is a website that purports to offer “hitman for hire” type services and others such as hacking, kidnapping, extortion, disfigurement by acid attack and sexual violence at the would-be customer’s request, prosecutors said.
The website claims to have over 12,000 registered members worldwide. It consists of a public forum where users are encouraged to openly and publicly ask questions of either the administrators or the alleged hitmen, court documents said.
There is also an option to create an account where would-be customers can submit an “order” detailing their precise requirements, including full intended victim details.
They then receive a “quote” for the job, and an alleged “hitman” is assigned to the account. An internal messaging system also enables a registered account to directly message any other registered account, an alleged hitman, or the administrators, authorities said. Customers pay for the services with cryptocurrencies.
Screenshots taken from the OKM website show the order for the murder-for-hire from site user “cattree” — with all its typos — placed on Jan. 11, 2023:
“Description: it needs to seem random or accident. or plant drugs, do not want a long investigation. she recently moved in with her new husband. she works at home and in office in birmingham. she works at wide orbit office [redacted] hoover, al when she works in office she works later she drives a blue subaru outback with alabama license plate [redacted] her husband drives a maroon jeep grand cherokee alabama license plate [redacted] her husband works at publix part time they have three dogs that bark and jump but nice dogs
Submitted on January 11, 5:05 UTC
Status: Payment submitted and secured in escrow
The total amount for your orders is: $9750 USD”
The information submitted in the description message regarding [redacted] was verified to be 100% accurate by HSI Birmingham. Additionally, “cattree” uploaded a photo of [redacted] to the website to ensure she could be positively identified by the assigned ‘hitman.””
Although the initial murder order was submitted on Jan. 11, Sasser had contacted the site earlier and had already conducted an initial payment via a Coinhub Bitcoin ATM machine on Dec. 31, 2023, the feds said.
Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Birmingham Birmingham advised the Prattville, Alabama Police Department of the threat and patrol officers were sent to monitor the home of the intended target of the suspected hit.
HSI Birmingham agents introduced themselves to the woman, informed her of the threat to her life, and she agreed to an interview.
She mentioned Sasser as a suspect and that she had traveled to Alabama in the fall of 2022, arriving at the home unannounced after her husband told her he was engaged to be married to her.
“Sasser responded to this news by stating, ‘I hope you both fall off a cliff and die,’ court documents said.
In the fall of 2022, the victim reported someone had gashed the sides of her vehicle with what appeared to be a key.
Following the incident, she began receiving unpleasant untraceable phone calls from someone using an electronic device to disguise a voice, court documents said.
Agents said they believe Sasser had been monitoring the couple’s movements on their fitness app.
The husband told agents he met Sasser on Match.com. He said she helped him in his planned Appalachian Trail hike by making reservations at known hostels and other rest points and took care of his vehicle for him in his absence.
OKM site user “cattree” and the site administrator had several back-and-forth messages regarding the murder for hire that continued from the initial “order” on Jan. 11 until the most recent message on April 3.
Several messages sent by “cattree” were inquiring about the status of the “job.” Other messages between “cattree” and OKM discuss additional bitcoin payment for the “job.”
At one point, “cattree” followed up with a message to OKM, saying “i have waited for 2 months and II days and the job is not completed. 2 weeks ago you said it was been worked on and would be done in a week. the job is still not done. does it need to be assigned to someone else. will it be done. what is the delay. when will it be done.”
The complaint included messages between the suspect and the site admin:
“Subject Re: Re: Re: update Mar 28 17:03 UTC
Message: Hello, she is not aware. He just failed as he did not attempted it yet, he felt like is too risky for him to do it Regards admin
Subject Re: Re: Re: Re: update Mar 28 17:57 UTC
message: yesterday she worked from home and went for a 2 mile walk by herself. assign to another that can complete the job.
Subject Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: update Mar 29 11: 1OUTC
Message: Hello, I have two other hitmen that I can assign on the job, but one wants 0-49 btc and the other 0.485 which one should I assign? Regards admin
Subject Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: update Mar29 21:13 UTC
message: assign to 0.485. i will add btc”
Sasser was arrested on May 18. She’s set to be arraigned on June 21.
Law&Crime’s Jerry Lambe contributed to this report.
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