Yura wrote back seven hours later, assuring him that the transaction had gone through, but days passed and nothing happened. Over the coming weeks, Stephen’s messages to Yura alternated between terse disappointment and increasingly detailed instructions. “I know her husband has a big tractor, so I suspect that he has gas cans in the garage,” he wrote, adding: “I ask that you only get her and not the dad or kid.” Like a friendly, chatroom-ready Satan, Yura responded promptly with messages reinforcing his client’s basest instincts. “Yes she is really a bitch and she deserve to die,” he wrote. Ninety minutes later he added, “Please notice 80% of our hitman are gang members who do drug dealing, beatings, occasional murder.” For an additional fee, he said, dogdaygod could arrange for a more practiced killer—an ex-military Chechen sniper—to handle the job.

Stephen had spent at least $12,000 on the hit man idea. Instead of giving up or reexamining the sin he was contemplating, he appeared to become more determined. He logged onto Dream Market, a dark-web marketplace best known for selling drugs, where he could explore other methods of killing. Common sense would suggest varying usernames, but he once again appeared as dogdaygod, as if he had become the character he’d created. He would make back his loss; the payout on Amy’s life insurance policy was $700,000.

In April 2016, about two months after Stephen first ordered the hit on his wife, Besa Mafia was hacked and Yura’s messages with clients—including dogdaygod—were dumped in an online pastebin. The data dump revealed that users with names like Killerman and kkkcolsia had paid tens of thousands of dollars in bitcoin to have people killed in Australia, Canada, and Turkey, as well as the United States. The hit orders soon reached the FBI, which directed local field offices across the country to make contact with the intended victims named in the Besa Mafia data dump. FBI special agent Asher Silkey, who worked in the bureau’s Minneapolis field office, learned that someone going by the name dogdaygod wanted Amy Allwine killed. He was tasked with warning her of the threat on her life.

On a cloudy Tuesday afternoon just after Memorial Day, Silkey enlisted the help of Terry Raymond, an officer with the local police force, and they drove to the Allwines’ house. Cottage Grove is a sleepy exurb, but, like police departments around the country, the local cops had been called on to address online threats with increasing frequency. Raymond, a reserved man with angular features accented by a trim beard, had been on the force for 13 years and was the department’s designated computer forensics specialist.

When Silkey and Raymond arrived, Stephen Allwine invited them inside. He told the two law enforcement officers that Amy was out, and they stood around in silence while he called her cell. Stephen struck Raymond as socially awkward, but he didn’t think much of it. He’d dealt with all sorts in his work.

The officers drove back to the station, and Amy showed up soon after. They met her in the lobby, which featured an oil painting of the department’s canine, Blitz, and led her to a sparsely furnished interview room. Because the FBI was handling the investigation, Raymond mostly listened as Silkey explained that someone who knew Amy’s travel schedule and her daily routine wanted her dead. Amy was stunned. She was further confused when Silkey mentioned the allegation about Amy sleeping with a dog trainer’s husband. She couldn’t think of anyone who considered her an enemy. “If you have any activity that you find suspicious, give us a call,” Raymond said as she left.

A few weeks later, the Allwines installed a motion-activated video surveillance system at their home, setting up cameras at different entrances. Stephen, meanwhile, purchased a gun—a Springfield XDS 9 mm. He and Amy decided to keep it under her side of the bed. They went on a date to the shooting range.