contract killing

Contract killing is a form of murder in which one party hires another party to kill a target individual or group of people. It involves an illegal agreement between two or more parties in which one party agrees to kill the target in exchange for some form of payment, monetary or otherwise. Either party may be a person, group, or an organization. Throughout history, contract killing has been associated with organized crime and with vendettas. For example, in recent United States history, the gang Murder, Inc. committed hundreds of murders in the 1920s to the 1940s on behalf of the National Crime Syndicate. Contract killing provides the hiring party with the advantage of not having to be directly involved in the killing. This makes it more difficult to connect said party with the murder and decreases the likelihood of establishing guilt for the committed murder, because the hiring party did not commit the murder; they only enabled it to happen. It is also often used by parties who do not have the ability to carry the killing themselves, such as a spouse contracting the murder of their partner.