Diana Reaves Costarakis lived on Buggy Whip Drive in Middleburg, an unincorporated community in northern Florida thirty miles southwest of downtown Jacksonville. The 70-year-old grandmother, in September 2013, asked an unidentified intermediary for advice on how to find a hit man to murder her daughter-in-law, Angela Costarakis. The person the elderly murder-for-hire mastermind reached out to took the request seriously enough to report Costarakis to the Duval County Sheriff's Office in Jacksonville.
As the standard investigative protocol in murder solicitation cases, murder mastermind Costarakis received a call from an undercover officer who offered to do the job. But first they would have to meet in person in order for the first installment of the hit money to exchange hands. If the suspect agreed to a face-to-face meeting with the phony contract killer, a videotaped event that normally took place in a box store parking lot, the case would proceed.
Diana Costarakis told the man on the phone that she would like to meet with him. She agreed to bring $500 in cash, the first downpayment for the hit. (It's amazing that almost every murder-for-hire mastermind falls for this trap. These people are so desperate to have someone killed they lose the ability to think straight.)
Diana Costarakis, on Wednesday, October 9, 2013, met with the undercover cop in the parking lot of a Home Depot store in Jacksonville. With this meeting she believed she was moving forward in her scheme to have Angela Costarakis murdered. She handed the phony hit man $500 in cash and promised a second downpayment of $1,000 the next time they met. Upon completion of the job Diana Costarakis said she would come up with an additional $3,500. Having someone killed, while a fairly simple straightforward task, didn't come cheap.
As a further incentive for the contract killer, the mastermind informed him that the murder target usually wore expensive jewelry, untraceable diamonds that could be fenced without risk. To facilitate the successful completion of the hit man's assignment she provided the undercover cop with a photograph of her daughter-in-law, a description of her car and her home address.
The next day in the same Home Depot parking lot, the homicidal grandmother handed the undercover cop $1,000 in cash. In response to the question of why she wanted Angela Costarakis taken out the mastermind described her daughter-in-law as a drunk who drove around intoxicated with her 6-year-old daughter in the car. Not only that, the murder-for-hire target, who was in the process of divorcing the mastermind's son, was moving to Denver with her boyfriend. According to the suspect the couple planned to take the little girl with them. (Real hit men don't care why the mastermind wants the target murdered.)
When asked if she was sure she wanted to go ahead with the murder plot Costarakis replied, "If you don't kill her, I will."
Having acquired all the evidence he needed, the undercover cop flashed his badge and arrested the suspect on the spot. After reading Costarakis her Miranda rights she asked to consult with an attorney before speaking to the police. As a result there was no interrogation and forthcoming confession.
Charged with criminal solicitation and criminal conspiracy, Diana Costarakis was placed in the Duval County jail where she was incarcerated without bond. She was arraigned on October 31, 2013.
The day following the murder-for-hire arrest, Angela Costarakis, the target of her mother-in-law's wrath, told a local television reporter that "I am beyond sad and it breaks my heart because it messes up the family. I have compassion. I don't want to see anyone spend the rest of their life in jail. However, I am still just not dealing with it. I just found out. I have not wrapped my head around it." The murder target said she did not have plans to move to Denver with her daughter.
On August 27, 2014, Diana Costarakis pleaded guilty to solicitation to commit a capital felony.
As the standard investigative protocol in murder solicitation cases, murder mastermind Costarakis received a call from an undercover officer who offered to do the job. But first they would have to meet in person in order for the first installment of the hit money to exchange hands. If the suspect agreed to a face-to-face meeting with the phony contract killer, a videotaped event that normally took place in a box store parking lot, the case would proceed.
Diana Costarakis told the man on the phone that she would like to meet with him. She agreed to bring $500 in cash, the first downpayment for the hit. (It's amazing that almost every murder-for-hire mastermind falls for this trap. These people are so desperate to have someone killed they lose the ability to think straight.)
Diana Costarakis, on Wednesday, October 9, 2013, met with the undercover cop in the parking lot of a Home Depot store in Jacksonville. With this meeting she believed she was moving forward in her scheme to have Angela Costarakis murdered. She handed the phony hit man $500 in cash and promised a second downpayment of $1,000 the next time they met. Upon completion of the job Diana Costarakis said she would come up with an additional $3,500. Having someone killed, while a fairly simple straightforward task, didn't come cheap.
As a further incentive for the contract killer, the mastermind informed him that the murder target usually wore expensive jewelry, untraceable diamonds that could be fenced without risk. To facilitate the successful completion of the hit man's assignment she provided the undercover cop with a photograph of her daughter-in-law, a description of her car and her home address.
The next day in the same Home Depot parking lot, the homicidal grandmother handed the undercover cop $1,000 in cash. In response to the question of why she wanted Angela Costarakis taken out the mastermind described her daughter-in-law as a drunk who drove around intoxicated with her 6-year-old daughter in the car. Not only that, the murder-for-hire target, who was in the process of divorcing the mastermind's son, was moving to Denver with her boyfriend. According to the suspect the couple planned to take the little girl with them. (Real hit men don't care why the mastermind wants the target murdered.)
When asked if she was sure she wanted to go ahead with the murder plot Costarakis replied, "If you don't kill her, I will."
Having acquired all the evidence he needed, the undercover cop flashed his badge and arrested the suspect on the spot. After reading Costarakis her Miranda rights she asked to consult with an attorney before speaking to the police. As a result there was no interrogation and forthcoming confession.
Charged with criminal solicitation and criminal conspiracy, Diana Costarakis was placed in the Duval County jail where she was incarcerated without bond. She was arraigned on October 31, 2013.
The day following the murder-for-hire arrest, Angela Costarakis, the target of her mother-in-law's wrath, told a local television reporter that "I am beyond sad and it breaks my heart because it messes up the family. I have compassion. I don't want to see anyone spend the rest of their life in jail. However, I am still just not dealing with it. I just found out. I have not wrapped my head around it." The murder target said she did not have plans to move to Denver with her daughter.
On August 27, 2014, Diana Costarakis pleaded guilty to solicitation to commit a capital felony.
In October 2014 the judge sentenced the 71-year-old murder-for-hire mastermind to seven years in prison.
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