Are you serious? He sold them before the conversation started, so his intentions were very clear. You think a nice tone would have changed this?
Good to know how to approach scammers for the future though: "Could you please give me my money back?

"
Yeah, it could have changed things. Dude upon waking up and finding 500+ bitcoins may have gotton excited and let his greed get the best of him. As easy as it was to sell, its just as easy to buy back. But we'll never know because both parties wanted to be a tough guy.
How to approach someone who has you by the balls? Hint: Not forcefully.
I imagine (fantasize?) phantomcircuit had contacted him privately initially and probably in a polite manner, and it seems that BenDavis had ignored the private contact and thus led to contacting him publicly in IRC.
That is NOT the case. Patrick and Donald sent email after email threatening BenDavis and his family. His children. His freedom. You make an EPIC mistake like this, and then you threaten someones KIDS about it? That is NOT the way to get what you want back.
You see this little guy? He got away with it because he's fucking Indiana Jones.
You however are just some random guy who thinks he got lucky.
You didn't get lucky you just bought yourself a one way trip to jail, we however don't much give a fuck about whether you go to jail or not.
We just want our money back.
Sent it back by noon and we wont need to file a police report and waste some of our time AND A LOT OF YOUR TIME.
and...
Donald Norman
Donald@bitcoinconsultancy.com to me
show details Sep 1 (2 days ago)
Hello BenDavis,
We are about to contact the Oregon police department to file a report of
theft. After which we will send this report of theft to all the leading
bitcoin businesses, especially exchanges (MtGox, TradeHill, Bitcoin7, et
cetera). We have been in contact with exchanges and reported the
addresses which the coins were sent to.
This is a criminal and serious matter. The previous police report I
filed led to an individual being arrested and put on trial. I am not
sure if he received the 9 months in jail as I did not follow up but
police detectives told me the evidence was damning and that it was
unlikely he would be let go.
The evidence we have already amassed against you is very strong. We know
who you are. If you do not want us to file a police report you must
cooperate right away. I will be filing the police report in one hour's
time. Once the police report is filed, there is no way that I know to
reverse it. Ideally, I would not want to send another person to jail so
please contact me.
Sincerely,
Donald Norman
The fuck outta here!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1 You cannot do anything about it. You fucked up. I am sure BenDavis welcomes you to try and press any kind of charges. Being you publicly admitted the code is the problem. Being that BTC is not legal tender. Being that you live in another country lmfao