ST. JOSEPH, Mo. — Investigators say an online video chat last Friday between a jailed inmate, 69-year-old Doyle Brant of Agency, Mo. and his 44-year-old daughter, Alesia Rivera, of St. Joseph, helped police foil an alleged murder for hire plot. The pair’s charged with conspiracy to commit first degree murder.
“Yeah, it’s mindboggling to me,” said Mark Randolph, who lives a few doors down from Rivera in St. Joe.
“It’s just unreal to me to hear about this. I had no idea,” said Randolph.
Court papers reveal Brant, who’s already in jail on charges of statutory rape and statutory sodomy involving a 14-year-old girl in 2006, promised to pay a confidential informant $2,000 to commit murder.
The probable cause statement alleges Rivera and Brant conspired with another inmate in the Buchanan County Jail to kill a witness in the rape case against Brant.
“Yeah, it’s a big surprise. Very shocking because like I said, this is a nice neighborhood and I don’t expect anything like this in the neighborhood,” said Kenneth Marshall, who lives across the street from Alesia Rivera.
The felony complaints reveal Rivera was to deliver $1,000 before the murder and then she would pass on another $1,000 after the crime. The court documents further reveal when Rivera spoke with her jailed father via a video chat, apparently on Skype, she agreed to meet another person to further the conspiracy.
However, investigators with the Buchanan County Sheriff’s Department stepped in, stopped the alleged murder scheme and arrested Rivera at her home Monday.
“We can’t monitor every phone call or every email, but we do the best we can. Now, that we provide them with technology to communicate, we also warn them that they’re being taped and sometimes they just don’t heed the warning,” said Captain Mark Brock with the Buchanan County Sheriff’s Department.