"he did deposit his original sale into his checking account," therefore he did not meet all the requirements of IRC 1031. You gotta use an intermediary, or do a same day exchange. 

Mr Starker start the whole ball rolling for doing a delayed exchange and many rules & regs have been written since. Hopefully he didn't ask you any questions before he did this. 

https://www.investopedia.com/financial-edge/0110/10-things-to-know-about-1031-exchanges.aspx