Man tried to hire hitman for ‘demolition job’ on estranged wife, feds say
A Massachusetts man tried to hire a hitman to “eliminate” his wife, but ended up unknowingly enlisting an undercover federal agent instead, officials said.
Massimo Marenghi, a 56-year-old from a Boston suburb, reportedly asked an unnamed individual to help him kill his estranged wife, according to a March 16 news release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for Massachusetts.
An attorney for Marenghi could not immediately be reached for comment by McClatchy News.
The individual reported the alarming request to law enforcement on New Year’s Day 2021, officials said. He was then told to introduce Marenghi to a covert operative posing as a hitman.
Marenghi — who was upset that his wife had filed a restraining order against him — reportedly met with the undercover agent twice over a period of nine days in January 2021 to plot the killing, officials said.
At the meetings, the man gave the agent photos of his wife and her home and provided instructions for how to avoid detection on her home’s security cameras, officials said.
The man also handed over his wife’s schedule to the agent, including times when he had custody of his children, “which he said would be the ‘best time for the construction work to start,’” officials said.
At the second meeting, he paid the agent a $1,500 cash deposit for the “demolition job,” officials said.
Marenghi was arrested in late January 2021 and was indicted the next month, officials said.
He pleaded guilty to a murder-for-hire charge on March 16, which carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison, officials said.
He will be sentenced in June.
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