By Forum Staff
On Monday, at the federal courthouse in Brooklyn, Yue Zhou was arraigned on an indictment charging her with murder-for-hire, according to prosecutors.
Zhou, 42, of Flushing, was arrested on June 5 in the Eastern District of Virginia and removed to the Eastern District of New York last Wednesday.
Photo Courtesy of Google
She was arraigned on Monday in Brooklyn federal court on an indictment charging her with murder-for-hire.
As alleged in the indictment and other court documents, between March 25, 2019 and April 4, 2019, Zhou sought to hire a hitman through a murder-for-hire website on the dark web (Website) to murder Victim-1, the spouse of the defendant’s then-romantic partner. Using an alias on the website, Zhou placed an order to have Victim-1 murdered. To pay for the murder, Zhou contracted with a Bitcoin exchange service in Ukraine to make a $5,000 payment in Bitcoin on her behalf to the Website. Zhou provided approximately $5,000 in cash to a middleman in Brooklyn and then communicated with the Website administrator to confirm payment. After sending payment, Zhou provided a detailed description of Victim-1, including her home, her work schedule, and the best times to target Victim-1, so that Victim-1’s husband would have an alibi for the murder. Zhou later tried to use to the Website to secure the murder of Victim-2, her romantic partner’s adult daughter. In February 2021, Zhou also sent a text message to a neighbor of Victim-2 seeking to hire that neighbor to kill Victim-2. Zhou offered the neighbor $10,000 and sexual favors in exchange for killing Victim-2 and disposing of the body in a lake.
Zhou was not aware at the time of her scheme that the Website was a scam operated by a third party and there was no actual hitman for hire.
