The woman has been sentenced for hiring a hitman, using $10,000 in Bitcoin, to kill the wife of a man she met on a dating site.
Melody Sasser, 48, paid nearly $10,000 in Bitcoin to a hitman through the dark web site “Online Killers Market” in 2023, according to court documents.
Sasser, who registered under the username “cattree,” contacted the website’s administrator to post her request. She specified that the killing should appear random or accidental and suggested planting drugs to avoid a lengthy investigation.
The target of the hit, referred to by the initials JW, resides in Prattville, Alabama, with her husband, DW. Sasser claimed to have met DW on Match.com and had previously assisted him on a hike along the Appalachian Trail before he married JW.
After two months of waiting for the job to be completed, Sasser became increasingly impatient. During this time, she left threatening voicemails on JW’s phone, using an app to disguise her voice. She also tracked the couple’s movements through the exercise app Strava, using the data to time her messages to the hitman.
Sasser expressed her frustration to the administrator of the dark web site, questioning the delay and whether the job needed to be reassigned.
The website offered various illegal services, including hacking, kidnapping, and extortion. Law enforcement later discovered a journal at Sasser’s home detailing her communications with the hitman site, as well as a stack of cash with a note referencing a Bitcoin address.
On June 7, 2023, a federal grand jury indicted Sasser for using interstate commerce facilities to commit murder-for-hire. She has now been sentenced to over eight years in prison and ordered to pay more than $5,000 in restitution.
