A 56-year-old Chadds Ford, Pa. woman has been charged with two counts of attempted murder and one count of money laundering for allegedly trying to hire a hit man to kill her ex-husband’s current wife, according to Mercer County Prosecutor Angelo Onofri.
Marilyn Zhou was arrested and charged by the Mercer County Prosecutor’s Office’s Special Investigations Unit, which had received information that she was looking for assistance in a murder-for-hire scheme, the prosecutor’s office said.
Zhou allegedly met with an undercover police officer, who was posing as a “hit man,” in Trenton on Dec. 18.
During the meeting, she allegedly told the undercover officer that she wanted to murder her ex-husband’s current wife, and provided him with two color photographs of the intended victim, plus $21,000 in cash, rubber nitrile gloves and a towel to carry out the murder, the prosecutor’s office said.
Zhou allegedly told the undercover officer that if the victim’s 13-year-old daughter was present at the time of the murder, she should also be killed, the prosecutor’s office said. She allegedly told him that she would pay an additional $20,000 after the murder had been carried out.
A few minutes after the meeting, Zhou was taken into custody by the Mercer County Prosecutor’s Office’s Special Investigations Unit.
A search warrant was carried out at her home in Pennsylvania later in the evening by the Special Investigations Unit and the Pennsylvania State Police, the prosecutor’s office said. Detectives seized $18,000 and the items that she had advised the undercover officer to use.
The Mercer County Prosecutor’s Office has filed a motion to detain Zhou, pending trial.
