[haus]

Another possibility is that the buyer had a bricked phone before the auction and decided he wanted a new one. He bought yours, and is returning his old bricked one to you. Be sure the serial numbers match along with your invisible seller's mark to ensure the item returned is the one you actually sold. Not that paypal will care, but you could consider mail fraud charges in that case. You'd probably need an original receipt with the ESN of the phone though.

When you get the phone back, if it's really yours, maybe some of the geniuses here can help you recover it. If azteca is right, the buyer probably tried to flash a GSM ROM on it or something. Maybe you could see if a Verizon service center can reflash it for you.

Really hate reading these kinds of things...sorry it happened to you. Add the buyer to your blocked bidder list in the future, of course.