A Wisconsin woman who transformed into an international hitwoman has been convicted of trying to kill the enemy of her online lover.
Aimee Betro, 44, traveled to the United Kingdom in 2019 to kill a man who was in a dispute with her online lover, Mohammed Nazir. Betro botched the killing and went into hiding for five years. She was convicted this week of several charges, including conspiracy to murder and possession of a firearm with intent, prosecutors announced.
"Betro tried to kill a man in a Birmingham street at point-blank range. It is sheer luck that he managed to get away unscathed," Specialist Prosecutor Hannah Sidaway OBE, from the Crown Prosecution Service in the West Midlands said. "Only Betro knows what truly motivated her or what she sought to gain from becoming embroiled in a crime that meant she travelled hundreds of miles from Wisconsin to Birmingham to execute an attack on a man she did not know."
Nazir and his father, Mohammed Aslam, had been in a dispute a local clothing shop owner that had ended in a physical confrontation. That dispute led to the revenge murder plot, prosecutors said.
In 2019, Betro flew to the UK, donned a niqab to hide her identity, staked out the target's home, and when he appeared, she attempted to shoot him at point-blank range. According to prosecutors, the gun jammed, and the man was able to flee.
Prosecutors said that Betro later returned to the home and sprayed it with bullets. No one was injured in the shooting. Betro used an unregistered cell phone to send taunting text messages to the father of her intended victim: "Where are you hiding" and "Stop playing hide 'n' seek you're lucky it jammed."
"The prosecution case included incriminating CCTV footage from the scene of the crime, digital forensics, mobile phone data and evidence collated from cooperation and collaboration across multiple countries and criminal justice agencies," Sidaway said.
In the aftermath of the shooting, Betro eventually fled the country. Her co-conspirators were caught, tried, and found guilty. In November 2024, Nazir was sentenced to 32 years for various charges, including conspiracy to murder, while his father Aslam, was sentenced to 10 years
Betro fled to Armenia, where she remained in hiding until she was found by a reporter from the Daily Mail who tipped off police to her location.
