Influencer is jailed for ten years after offering ‘hitman’ $60,000 to murder three people including a social media rival and her boyfriend
An influencer has been jailed for a decade after offering a ‘hitman’ $60,000 to murder three people, including a social media rival and her boyfriend.
Texas-based content creator Ashley Grayson, 35, ran a successful internet business from her home in Dallas and was a self-proclaimed bestseller, course creator and philanthropist, according to the US Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Tennessee.
Grayson, who claimed to also be an eight-figure business coach, had contacted a potential hitman in 2022, who was in fact a friend she had offered to fly to Dallas with her husband telling them simply it was a ‘business opportunity’.
This proposal would turn out to be the social media star asking her friend and her husband to kill three people for $20,000 per hit, reported Fox 4 News.
The three people included in Grayson’s kill list were her ex, a rival who ran a similar company to her in Mississippi, and a Texas woman who had made negative social media posts about her online, prosecutors said.
‘This was a 21st-century crime where online feuds and senseless rivalries bled into the real world,’ acting US Attorney Reagan Fondren said.
‘The defendant tried to hire someone to murder a woman over things that happened exclusively on the internet.
‘Fortunately, no one was physically hurt in this case, but the victim and her family still felt a severe and emotional impact as the result of the defendant’s actions.
Texas influencer Ashley Grayson was jailed for 10 years after hiring a hitman, who turned out to be her friend, to kill three people for $60,000
The content creator and business owner set out to get her ex boyfriend, a business rival, and a woman who made negative remarks about her online, killed
Grayson, 35, will not be eligible for parole as it was a federal case
Grayson was sentenced to 120 months in prison, the maximum sentence permitted for her crime, and three years of supervised release
‘The proactive response from the investigating agencies and our prosecutors prevented an even more serious crime from occurring.’
The Memphis couple pretended to go along with the plan – but instead handed police a video of Grayson saying she would pay them an extra $5,000 to kill the Mississippi woman within the week.
The couple later sent Grayson a clip of police lights from another related incident, claiming they had attempted to carry out the murder but were caught.
They later met with the content creator and were handed $10,000 for their ‘attempt’, prosecutors added.
In July 2023, a grand jury in Tennessee indicted Grayson and her husband for use of an interstate facility in commission of murder-for-hire.
The case went to trial in March this year, where a jury found Grayson guilty but acquitted her husband, Joshua.
Last month, Grayson was sentenced to 120 months in prison, the maximum sentence permitted for her crime, and three years of supervised release.
The business owner, with over 1,500 social media followers, will not be eligible for parole as it was a federal case.
Special Agent in Charge Joe Carrico of the FBI Nashville Field Office, Memphis Resident Agency said: ‘This murder-for-hire plot underscores the strength of joint federal law enforcement efforts to ensure the safety of the citizens in our community.
‘This sentence demonstrates the commitment of the FBI and our partners to investigate violent crimes and root out those who seek to prey on the public.’
