It's amazing how many people will say, "That's stupid" and "Will never happen to me."  Go read the scam accusations forum, it's littered with, "I was stupid..." and "This never happens to me..." 

Read the article again, clearly he is still a proponent of BTC, and seems to have gone out of his way to make sure the article wasn't a negative piece on BTC. He's also keenly aware of the mistake: “My mistake was paying money (in the form of the digital bitcoins) first, which exposed me to more risk,” he said.

Given the sensational nature of media, this could have been written with BTC in a much poorer light.

Yes, it is based on the same story. The person in the article was me.

The press reached out to me after seeing the police report filed. 
The reason I spoke with them was precisely so that the article would not be yet another cautionary tale against the perils and dangers of Bitcoin.

I wanted to be clear that the scamming occurred because of a trust-based error on my part, not because Bitcoin itself is inherently evil.

Not our David Williamson, but wanted to share to lighten the tone for a sec or two--enjoy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCzTYrnOg-8

M-of-N escrow. No single party. Even heavily trusted members, escrowers can drop the ball with single party escrow.

Multiple trusted parties with a majority vote allowing release of funds.

I like the idea of physical BTC, but they are far easier to counterfeit/scam.  

I'm glad I'm not that guy from Wisconsin.

Is that the same Rassah that admitted to knowingly accepting stolen coins?  That doesn't meet my definition of trustworthy.

https://bt.irlbtc.com/view/447668.0