Murder-for-Hire 2025

What's New in the Business of Murder

Sixty-two-year-old criminal defense attorney Gary Guymon was a regular fixture in Las Vegas courtrooms, representing clients before judges who knew him from his days in the Clark District Attorney's office. But according to police, he was doing a lot more to his clients than defending them; he was allegedly running a racket he dubbed the "$100 Club," an exploitive operation where he forced vulnerable female clients into prostitution. These were women facing criminal charges, women he was supposed to defend. Investigators say he also used his intimate knowledge of the legal system to keep them quiet.

sixty-two-year-old Gary Lee Guynon, courtesy of KLAS

When one woman finally tried to break free, police say Guymon crossed an even darker line. Using his connections with shady characters, he reportedly reached out to a convicted felon to arrange a hit. Luckily, because police were already investigating him for sex trafficking (they started in November 2024), they intercepted incriminating messages and phone records before the hired hitman could act.

Meanwhile, Guymon continued to represent clients in court. He was in court as late as mid-January 2025. But the next time he shows up to see a judge, he will be in a dicier role: criminal defendant. Current charges include sex trafficking, conspiracy to commit murder, pandering, and witness intimidation.

So far, he has denied all charges. When asked about the allegations of forced prostitution, he would only admit to receiving "lap dances" from clients. He was, he said, just "trying to help them out."

This killer contract didn't take place in some dimly lit underground garage. There was no cash-filled briefcase sliding across a seedy bar top. The employer wasn't some mob boss taking revenge for a previous murder or an arms dealer trying to snuff out the competition. Welcome to murder-for-hire 2025, where the person plotting your death is as likely to be wearing a suit as a ski mask.

The Numbers Tell a Story

Recent research reveals another startling truth about contract killings: they're an equal-opportunity affair. Forty-seven percent of people who try to arrange them are women. She could be your neighbor next door, your pickleball partner, or the owner of your hair salon. What they have in common is that they're generally otherwise law-abiding citizens who, like Guymon, decide that murder is a solution to their problems.

This is striking, given that men commit ninety percent of conventional murders. But it tracks with the fact that women are nearly as likely as men to wish someone was dead.

Take Martie Soderberg from Spokane County, Washington. A stay-at-home mom with three kids, she wasn't happy in her marriage. Rather than file for divorce, she took out a $300,000 life insurance policy on her husband, Russell. She then reached out on Facebook to an old high school friend, Martin Drake, hoping he would help speed along her desired change in marital status. The two hadn't talked for more than twenty years.

Martie Soderberg, courtesy of Oxygen

The two met for lunch. "That's when she dropped the bomb that she was trying to get me to kill her husband. I was sick to my stomach after my conversation with her." Soderberg laid out her plan with disturbing casualness. She wanted the hit to take place on Halloween. Trick-or-treating with the kids would be a perfect alibi. "Psychopath is the best way to describe her," Drake would later tell investigators.

Drake's difficult life circumstances likely inspired Soderberg's choice of hitman; he was struggling with a drug addiction and was homeless. But struggling did not mean soulless. Instead of accepting her offer of a cut of the insurance payout, Drake went straight to the police, who promptly wired him up and captured more than just murder plans: a flirty invitation to romance, a tale of a previous hitman she had tried to hire, and a confession to a 2013 arson that had destroyed the Soderberg's mobile home. When it came to insurance fraud, this was not Martie's first rodeo.

Why They Do It

There are common motives in most murders-for-hire. The top three are eliminating an unwanted current or former partner (nineteen percent), for money (sixteen percent), or to silence a witness (thirteen percent). Sometimes, these motives intertwine, creating complex webs of desperation and calculation.

Sammy Shafer, Jr., courtesy of Madison County State Attorney

Meet businessman Sammy Shafer Jr., whose alleged murder-for-hire plot in early 2025 combined toxic relationship dynamics with a custody dispute. Police say Shafer was furious that his estranged wife, Sarah, had found love with Portia Rowland, a thirty-two-year-old mechanic and accomplished athlete. The Shafers were in the middle of a bitter divorce. Sarah and Portia had been planning their wedding and even discussed starting a family together.

But Shafer had deadlier plans. When threats to prevent their children from seeing their mom didn't result in Sarah ending her new relationship, investigators say he turned to one of his employees, Gary Johnson, for a more permanent solution. Johnson roped Marty Shaw, his cousin, in as the driver. On a cold January morning in Collinsville, Illinois, as Rowland warmed up her car in her driveway, the shooter, Gary Johnson, lay in wait in an alley and then gunned Rowland down.

The price for ending Portia's life? Ten thousand dollars, an amount carefully calculated to stay below the amount that might trigger banking red flags. Sixty-five hundred went to Johnson, and thirty-five hundred went to Shaw.

Old-fashioned police work combined with modern technology to crack the case. License plate readers had captured the getaway vehicle's movements, leading to quick arrests. Both the shooter and driver allegedly confessed, laying out the cold calculation behind the early morning ambush.

The Madison County State's Attorney would later describe it as a "calculated and coldhearted murder-for-hire scheme based on a personal grievance." But for those who knew and loved Portia, it was the tragic end of a life filled with promise, cut short by someone who decided that if he couldn't control the situation, he would destroy it.

More Methods Behind the Murders

Timing matters when it comes to murder-for-hire. Sixty-three percent of "successful" hits happen at the victim's home between 2 and 8 AM; we saw this with Portia Rowland's death. These choices aren't random; it's often when victims are most vulnerable and witnesses are few.

As far as the victims themselves, two-thirds are men. Nine out of ten are white. Most fall between the ages of twenty-six and forty-nine. They're often caught up in bitter divorces, financial problems, business disputes, or, like in Guymon's case, situations where they could testify against someone. And most have no idea someone is plotting their murder.

Modern Murder in a Digital Age

Today's would-be instigators often start their search for a hitman online. The dark web hosts countless sites promising professional hits, complete with reviews and ratings. Around ninety percent of these sites are scams. Some are clever criminals who just take the money and run. Others are law enforcement sting operations, waiting to catch people who think they can navigate the criminal underworld. But most hires still come through old-school connections: family members, business associates, or word of mouth.

When Plans Fail

Sadly, nearly half of all murder-for-hire plots achieve their goal. As we say with Martie Sodergerg, law enforcement stops forty-one percent; often, the hitman is the weak link; they go to the police rather than their target.

But there are casualties even when the murder plot fails. Court proceedings reveal just how deeply these cases affected families. Initially, Martie Soderberg's daughter, Jessica, stood by her mother, even helping to hire a private attorney. But when the wiretap recordings were played in court, the truth sunk in. "The audio was bad. It sealed what I feared the most, that she was guilty," Jessica said. She has yet to visit her mother in prison.

For Russell Soderberg, the betrayal was almost incomprehensible. The weekend before his wife's arrest, they'd gone apple-picking together. They'd eaten at a restaurant. And, yet, she'd planned his murder with the same casualness with which she'd planned their family outings.

The Bottom Line

These cases reveal how thin the line can be between respectability and murder. Whether driven by greed, fear of imprisonment, bitterness, or revenge, the instigators convince themselves that murder is their best option. They often start their journey thinking they're too smart to get caught, not realizing they're about to become another statistic in the growing database of contract killings that didn't go as planned.

As always, thank you for reading this issue of The Mind Detective. Please pass this along to your true-crime-following friends. If there’s a case you’d like me to cover, let me know!