New York Woman Headed to Prison in Murder-for-Hire Scheme

A team of federal law enforcement agencies worked together to send a New York bank manager to prison for instigating a murder for hire scheme targeting her brother-in-law.

40-year-old Reshma Massarone was recently sentenced to more than nine years in federal prison and three years of supervised release, after pleading guilty.

According to court documents, Massarone engaged with a hitman to kill her brother-in-law in exchange for $10,000. However, the person she communicated with was a foreign police officer who became an undercover law enforcement agent to catch Massarone in the act.

Massarone allegedly exchanged dozens of messages and phone calls with the undercover agent, requesting that her brother-in-law be murdered.

Court documents show that Massarone also told the agent she had other “jobs” for him and that he would get paid if he “[got] rid” of the victim for her.

“The defendant devised a chilling plan to have a member of her own family murdered for the low price of ten thousand dollars.  Her plan was unthinkably heartless,” said U.S. Attorney Damian Williams of the Southern District of New York.

The victim was never murdered and prosecutors say that as time passed, Massarone grew impatient and urged the agent to kill the victim, even suggesting that “rat poison can do a great job.”

U.S. Attorney Williams thanked the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), and New York state and local police for their help in the case.