Garrett SaundryIt’s a known fact that the domain name industry for the most part is like the wild west, few rules, no enforcement and cattle rustlers everywhere you look. Well there’s some good news on that front. There seems to be a new sheriff in town who’s not afraid of the bandits.
In 2005 some big names in the domaining business (Marc Ostrofsky, attorney Albert Angel and Lesli Angel) partnered up to buy the domain p2p.com for $160 000. Marc’s name may not sound familiar, but he was the one who sold business.com for $7.5 million in 1999, so he’s not exactly wet behind the ears when it comes to the domain name business. Albert Angel is a former Justice Department prosecutor specializing in internet payment processing. Again, not somebody that you really want to be messing around with.
Along comes Daniel Goncalves. He managed to hack into an AOL email account used by Angels and retrieve the login details for p2p.com from GoDaddy, who had the registration for the domain. Goncalves then transferred the domain to a GoDaddy account that he owned. After waiting 60 days he transferred to a new registrar, and 60 days after that he listed the domain for sale on eBay.com. The auction closed and the winning bid for the domain was $111 000 from Mark Madsen, an NBA player and domain name investor. The purchase was a good faith purchase, at the time of the purchase Madsen did not know that the domain name had been stolen.
When the owners of the domain realized it had been stolen, they went to Joshua Pelissero to help them track down just what happened with this domain. In 2007 the Angels went to the police in both Florida (where they live) and New Jersey (where the theft happened). Florida eventually dropped the case due to lack of evidence. Not letting something as small as that deter them, they proceeded with a suit civilly.
In May 2009 the New Jersey District Attorney approved the indictment, and on 30 July 2009 Goncalves was arrested at his home. He is currently out of jail after posting a $60 000 bond.
In 2007 a civil suit was filed against Daniel Goncalves and Mark Madsen to retrieve the domain. This was amended in June 2009 to include new defendants, Goncalves brother and wife as well as Godaddy. This suit is still ongoing.
p2p.com is currently registered with Godaddy, but has privacy protect on it so it’s difficult to see just who is the current owner, though it’s been reported by those closely connected to the case that Madsen still retains control over this domain.
It will be interesting to see how this one plays out, it’s difficult to prove theft of something that exists on a server somewhere and does not have any sort of physical presence.