By Calvin Palmer
A South Florida woman was arrested today shortly after she believed her husband of six months had been murdered by a hit man she allegedly hired.
Dalia Dippolito, 26, turned up at her home in Boyton Beach this morning to find police and crime scene tape everywhere. Believing her 38-year-old husband to be dead, she began sobbing.
But it was all part of an elaborate hoax set up by the police. The hit man she met with was an undercover police officer.
A friend of Dippolito tipped off police about her murderous intentions and arranged for her to meet the supposed hit man.
The undercover detective met with Dippolito on Monday and asked for $3,000 in cash and a key to the couple’s home.
With husband, Michael Dippolito, safe at police headquarters, police staged the elaborate crime scene.
“We wanted it dramatic,” Boynton Beach Police Department spokeswoman Stephanie Slater said. “We wanted her to believe her husband was dead.”
When Dippolito was taken to police headquarters she was shown her husband and arrested on a solicitation to commit first-degree murder charge.
A somewhat shocked and confused husband said that his wife’s motive was probably money.
He said he had met her at a Starbucks less than a year ago. Since their marriage weird things began happening. Money would disappear. Someone would call police anonymously to accuse him of being a drug dealer. Police were called to the home once when they had an argument.
The couple married in late January, three days after his divorce from an earlier marriage was finalized.
He was still in a daze as today’s events began to sink in.
“It’s like a movie,” he said. “It’s believable yet unbelievable.”
[Based on reports by the Palm Beach Post and Associated Press.]
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