Tennessee Air National Guardsman arrested after applying to be hitman online

A Tennessee Air National Guardsman was arrested last week after applying to be a hitman on a parody website.

Josiah Ernesto Garcia, 21, was charged on Thursday with the use of interstate facilities in the commission of murder-for-hire by using the fake hitman website “Rentahitman.com.”

Garcia explored the site when he “needed money to support his family” and “began searching online for contract mercenary jobs,” according to a press release from the US Attorney’s Office- Middle District of Tennessee.

Garcia first made contact with the site on Feb. 16, when he filed an employment inquiry form indicating he was interested in “obtaining employment as a hitman.”

He noted his “military experience and rifle expertise” in the form while also requesting an in-depth job description, according to court documents filed on April 12.

The hopeful hitman remained in contact with the website over the next several days, providing his Tennessee driver’s license, a headshot, and a resume.

“Im looking for a job, that pays well, related to my military experience (Shooting and Killing the marked target) so I can support my kid on the way,” Garcia said through a follow-up email, according to the criminal complaint. “What can I say, I enjoy doing what I do, so if I can find a job that is similar to it, (such as this one) put me in coach!”

On his resume, Garcia bragged about being an expert marksman “awarded for not missing a single bullseye on all of the targets and for shooting expert with 2 (or more) weapons.”

Garcia, who was employed by the Air National Guard since July 2021, claimed he went by the nickname “Reaper,” which he earned “from Military experience and Marksmanship.”

Feeling antsy for work, Garcia sent two follow-ups between February 23 and March 13 hoping to hear back about potential work.

Following an order from the FBI, the website’s owner, Bob Innes, responded to Garcia, saying “Josiah, a Field Coordinator will be in touch in the near future. You will receive a message when they are ready. Timing is based on client needs.”

An undercover FBI agent was assigned to pose as an agent for the website and contacted Garcia for a phone interview, which led to the two meeting for an in-person where Garcia said he was “looking into [killing people for money] for a while.”

On April 12, Garcia was scheduled to meet with the undercover agent to discuss a potential “target” that would pay $5,000 for taking out the client’s abusive husband.

Garcia was given the first half of the payout along with images of the fake target.

Upon receiving the payment, Garcia asked if photo evidence of the murdered target was required before the FBI made the arrest.

During one of his post-arrest interviews with the FBI, Garcia admitted to being offered and subsequently accepted a job at Vanderbilt Medical in Nashville, and was wanting to tell the undercover agent the news during their meeting.

Following the arrest, the FBI searched Garcia’s home and recovered an AR-styled rifle, the same one he allegedly said he would use during contracted killings.

Rentahitman.com was created in 2005 by four friends attempting to create a cyber security company, as it was a play on words with “Rent as in hire us, Hit as in network traffic, and men, because there were four of us,” website owner Innes told People in last November.

While the company was failing to get off the ground, it began receiving “many inquiries about murder-for-hire services,” which led Innes to turn it into a parody site that included false testimonies from fictional customers, a Service Request Form and even a careers tab where people, like Garcia can “apply” to be a hitman.

Both the “Service Request Form” and “Careers Form” have been used many times to arrest people interested in using the services of a hitman on someone they know, including a New Mexico man who plotted his in-law’s murder on the site.

In July 2020, a Michigan woman attempted to hire a hitman through the website to have her husband killed for $5,000, a crime she admitted to in November 2021.

If the false testimonies and fake advertisements weren’t warnings of the parody site, under the “highest level of education section” in the Careers Form “Trump University, Home Depot U & McDonald’s University credits are acccepted.”

If convicted, Garcia faces up to 10 years in prison.