My brother-in-law ran for District Attorney in a small district in a southern US state. He hired a person to set up an campaign website for him. Additionally, the domain name of FIRSTNAMELASTNAME (my bother-in-law's name) was registered by this person in the com, net, and org extensions. Now the elections are over (he lost) and he would like the domain name for a business site. They have contacted the person and asked to buy the domain name, even though their contract with him states that they already own the domain. He refuses all offers and doesn't make a counter offer.
The domain was registered at a small Wild West affiliate registrar. While checking out the whois information I came across some interesting information. While the net and org domains shows the squatters information, the com domain shows my Brother-in-Law's name, address, telephone number, and email address as the registrant, technical contact, and administrative contact. That being the case, I attempted to open an account at the registrar in my Brother-in-Law's name and initiate a transfer of the domain. However, the registrar states that an email is being sent to the squatters email address, not my brother-in-law's email address for confirmation. The squatter then denies the transfer. I had hoped that maybe my brother-in-law already had some long forgotten account with the registrar and that the confirmation email would be sent to him.
He is an attorney and has sent C&D's and formal requests to the squatter to no avail. Does anyone have any ideas or suggestions on how he can go about regaining his domain name? Can a civil suit regain his domain or does he need to go through WIPO? We don't want to alert the squatter to the Whois information because it would be real easy for him to change it. Is there some way to compel the registrar to transfer the domain based upon the whois information without contacting the squatter? If it helps, his first name is so unique, that and exact "FIRSTNAME LASTNAME" search on Google brings up only 4200 results and EVERY one is about him.
Thanks in advance for your suggestions.
Alan
The domain was registered at a small Wild West affiliate registrar. While checking out the whois information I came across some interesting information. While the net and org domains shows the squatters information, the com domain shows my Brother-in-Law's name, address, telephone number, and email address as the registrant, technical contact, and administrative contact. That being the case, I attempted to open an account at the registrar in my Brother-in-Law's name and initiate a transfer of the domain. However, the registrar states that an email is being sent to the squatters email address, not my brother-in-law's email address for confirmation. The squatter then denies the transfer. I had hoped that maybe my brother-in-law already had some long forgotten account with the registrar and that the confirmation email would be sent to him.
He is an attorney and has sent C&D's and formal requests to the squatter to no avail. Does anyone have any ideas or suggestions on how he can go about regaining his domain name? Can a civil suit regain his domain or does he need to go through WIPO? We don't want to alert the squatter to the Whois information because it would be real easy for him to change it. Is there some way to compel the registrar to transfer the domain based upon the whois information without contacting the squatter? If it helps, his first name is so unique, that and exact "FIRSTNAME LASTNAME" search on Google brings up only 4200 results and EVERY one is about him.
Thanks in advance for your suggestions.
Alan
