Bergen County Woman Sentenced To 10 Years In Prison For Murder-For-Hire Plot Against Rival

NEWARK, N.J. – A Bergen County, N.J., woman was sentenced today to 120 months in prison for trying to hire a hitman to kill a romantic rival by shooting her in the head, U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman announced.

Nicole Faccenda, 44, of Lyndhurst, N.J., previously had pleaded guilty on Aug. 8, 2012 before U.S. Magistrate Judge Patty Shwartz to an information charging her with one count of using the mail and facilities of commerce with the intent of carrying out a murder-for-hire plan.  Faccenda was charged in October 2011 with offering to pay someone to kill her ex-boyfriend’s new girlfriend. U.S. District Judge Faith S. Hochberg imposed the sentence today in Newark federal court.

According to documents filed in this case and statements made in court:

Faccenda had been in a long-term relationship with a man who had fathered her child. The relationship ended when the man began seeing with another woman, with whom he also had a child.  On Oct. 19, 2011, Faccenda contacted a person she knew and trusted in Florida and asked for help in finding someone to carry out a hit on her ex-boyfriend’s new girlfriend. She said she had a black dress ready to wear to the intended victim’s funeral and would “spit on the casket.” 

The acquaintance contacted federal authorities, and the next day, spoke again with Faccenda – a conversation that was recorded by agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. The acquaintance told Faccenda he had found someone to do the murder. The acquaintance and an undercover ATF task force officer posing as a hitman then met with Faccenda at a Mahwah, N.J., supermarket parking lot to arrange the killing.

Faccenda agreed to pay the undercover hitman $5,000 in advance and $5,000 after the girlfriend was killed. In a number of recorded conversations, Faccenda said she wanted the new girlfriend to be gone, and her boyfriend to be miserable. She said she wanted the girlfriend shot in the head and that the boyfriend could be shot in the foot. If something happened to the girlfriend’s children, she said, “Oh, well, I’m sorry.”

On Oct. 24, 2011, Faccenda met with her acquaintance from Florida in a Secaucus, N.J., gas station parking lot and gave him an envelope with $2,000 for the purported hitman. Over the next few hours, she provided information, including a name, photo, work schedule and license plate number of the intended victim. Two days later, on Oct. 26, 2011, the friend called Faccenda and told her the victim had been shot in the head in what appeared to be a robbery. Faccenda was arrested at work by ATF agents a short time later.

In addition to the prison term, Judge Hochberg sentenced Faccenda to three years of supervised release and ordered her to pay restitution of $19,292.

U.S. Attorney Fishman credited special agents of the ATF under the direction of Acting Special Agent in Charge George Belsky with the investigation leading to today’s sentencing.

The government is represented by Special Litigation Counsel Serina M. Vash of the U.S. Attorney’s Office Criminal Division in Newark.            

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Defense Counsel: Peter Willis Esq., Jersey City, N.J.