After being found guilty of a murder-for-hire scheme, an American social media influencer who owns an online business was given a 10-year sentence in federal prison.
According to the US Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Tennessee, Ashley Grayson, 35, operated a well-known online business from her Dallas home, promoting herself as a philanthropist, course developer, eight-figure business coach, and bestseller.
According to Fox 4 News, she called a friend in Memphis in 2022 and urged her to travel to Dallas to talk about a “business opportunity” where she and her husband would kill three people for $20,000 each.
Among the three were Grayson’s former partner and a resentful rival who operated a comparable internet company in Mississippi.
Prosecutors said she allegedly requested them to k!ll a Texas lady who had posted disparaging remarks about her on social media.
“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.”
The Memphis pair feigned agreement, but instead provided authorities with a video of Grayson promising to pay them an additional $5,000 to execute the Mississippi woman’s murder within a week.
Later, the couple said they attempted to carry out the murder but were caught, sending Grayson a video of police lights from an unrelated event. After meeting with Grayson, they received $10,000 for their “attempt,” according to the prosecution.
Grayson received the maximum punishment of 120 months in prison after being convicted guilty of murder-for-hire. Since it was a federal matter, she will not be eligible for parole.
Her husband had already been found not guilty of any wrongdoing.
