A Richmondville teenager was arrested on charges of allegedly offering his services as a hit man after driving from his home to meet a man in New Jersey to set up a murder.
The man turned out to be an undercover officer, according to the Bergen County Prosecutor's Office.
Joshua Craig Rowling, 18, of 223 Franzen Road, Richmondville, was arrested relating to a conspiracy to commit murder investigation, according to acting Bergen County Prosecutor Gurbir S. Grewal. Mr. Rowling was arrested on Friday, October 21, without incident at 219 Ramapo Valley Road, Mahwah, New Jersey.
The arrest is the result of a joint investigation conducted by members of the Bergen County Prosecutor's Office Cyber Crimes Unit, Homeland Security Investigations in Newark, and the Mahwah Police Department.
During the course of a joint investigation conducted by the BCPO Cyber Crimes Unit and HSI, law enforcement learned that Mr. Rowling used the "dark web" to offer his services as a hit man, according to police.
The investigation revealed that he allegedly agreed with another to commit a murder in exchange for a firearm fitted with a silencer and cash, police added. Ultimately, Mr. Rowling drove from his home in Richmondville to Mahwah, New Jersey to meet with a person he thought was seeking his services as a hit man, but who was actually an undercover officer.
Search warrants were subsequently executed at his home in New York as well as of his vehicle in New Jersey, and numerous items of evidence were recovered, according to police.
Mr. Rowling was charged with one count of conspiracy to commit murder for hire in the first-degree, one count of possession of a weapon for an unlawful purpose in the second-degree, one count of unlawful possession of a weapon in the second-degree, and one count of possession of a silencer in the fourth-degree, police said.
Bail was set at $1 million with no 10 percent option, along with the surrendering of his passport, no Internet and no firearms, police added.
He was remanded to the Bergen County jail in lieu of bail pending his first appearance in Bergen County Central Municipal Court in Hackensack, New Jersey on Wednesday, November 2, police said.