NEW BRAUNFELS, Texas – A New Braunfels man was arrested after he tried to hire a hitman to kill a Comal County sheriff’s deputy, federal court documents allege.
According to a federal complaint, Dillon Scott Dees, 33, approached a man at a job site in Bexar County on June 26 and asked him if he knew someone who could “carry out a murder for compensation.”
Little did Dees know that the man he approached was an informant with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, the complaint stated.
The informant told the DEA that Dees wanted the deputy killed because he “was a problem for him.” Dees told the informant that the deputy was his ex-father-in-law, who he blamed for unresolved child custody issues involving his ex-wife that he would report to law enforcement.
On June 27, the informant met with Dees to further discuss the potential hit, which was being secretly recorded. During the meeting, Dees told the informant that he would pay the hitman $27,000 in Bitcoin, which he said “would make the payment untraceable,” the complaint said.
Dees told the informant that he wanted the killing to take place in Ohio, where his daughter, his ex-wife and her new husband were going to move. He requested that the murder not take place around his daughter and that she not witness it, the complaint stated. Dees also didn’t want to talk to the hitman, only to the informant.
Dees told the informant that a court hearing on July 13 would decide whether his ex-wife would be allowed to move to Ohio with their daughter. The suspect said if the court ruled in his favor, he didn’t want the murder to be carried out, but if it didn’t, he wanted it to take place.
The two again talked about why Dees wanted his former father-in-law killed, and the suspect said the deputy was the reason why his ex-wife wanted to move out of state and blamed her for being convicted of a theft charge for which he was on probation. The informant told Dees the hitman would need a down payment, to which he agreed, the complaint stated.
After the meeting, the informant gave the recording devices to the DEA agent, who then gave it to the FBI. A warrant was issued for Dees, who was arrested on July 6 and is being held without bond pending trial on a charge of interstate commerce in the commission of murder for hire.
If Dees is found guilty, he faces up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.