South Florida man who wanted hitman to ‘eliminate’ his ex-girlfriend’s fiance sentenced to 7 years in prison

A Pembroke Pines man was sentenced to seven years in federal prison Wednesday after pleading guilty to writing and mailing multiple letters to a person he thought was a hitman about how he wanted “someone eliminated” and was willing to pay $10,000 for the job.

Federal prosecutors asked the court to impose a sentence of nine years, and Ryan Hadeed had faced a maximum sentence of 10 years, according to court records. After his release, Hadeed will be on supervised release for three years.

Hadeed, 43, pleaded guilty in July to using the mail to commit murder-for-hire after he sent three letters to a person who worked at a gun store in Coral Springs, who he was told “could arrange” the hit job, Hadeed wrote. He wanted his ex-girlfriend’s fiance gone.

But Hadeed had mailed the letters to someone who was a confidential source and used to work for the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, court records said.

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The first letter that the confidential source received, written in September 2021, said the intended hitman would receive $10,000 in cash for taking out a person living in Tampa.

“You can be there and back in a day. You get their photo, first name, work address and home address,” Hadeed’s letter said.

If the hitman agreed to the job, Hadeed wrote in the letter, he should hang a blank sheet of paper in the gun store’s window and to go to a coffee shop in Coral Springs and buy a cup of coffee, court records say.

The return address and name on the letters were fake, Hadeed wrote, using the name Alan Smithee. The confidential source hung the paper but did not go to the coffee shop, according to court records.

Hadeed mailed a second letter to the confidential source, offering another chance to accept the murder-for-hire.

“This is important. You could take the money and do nothing. I would be out 10 gs and have to find someone else,” he wrote. “If this works out, theres [sic] another job that will pay double or you name your [sic] price In a small town in Georgia. Or no more. Tampa first.”

[ RELATED: ‘I need someone eliminated’: Pembroke Pines man allegedly offered $10,000 in murder-for-hire plot ]

The third letter Hadeed sent included a map that showed the victim’s address, but Hadeed wrote, “There’s a problem. The home address of the individual is a gated community,” court records said. The confidential source was instructed to hang up another piece of paper to accept the job before payment.

Several days later, the confidential source opened a package to find $10,000 cash, photos of the person to be killed, and the intended victim’s personal information, court records said.

Investigators spoke to another one of Hadeed’s ex-girlfriends who lives in the small town of Rome, Georgia. Federal prosecutors considered filing additional charges against Hadeed for this second intended victim, which would have carried a maximum sentence of 20 years, court records said, but Hadeed reached a plea deal instead.

Hadeed wrote a statement to Judge William P. Dimitrouleas that he read at his sentencing hearing Wednesday in which he expressed his regret. He wrote that during the COVID pandemic, he grew isolated and struggled with his mental health.

The conversations he had with his ex-girlfriend, the one whose fiance he intended to have killed, “countered that depression,” Hadeed wrote.

“I became obsessed with it,” he wrote. “It was akin to taking a drug. And like any drug addiction, I would have done anything to have more of that sensation.”