In an elaborate plan, the National Guard hired a hitman and purchased multiple guns to kill a man who fatally crashed into his mother's car nearly eight years ago.
Rhett Michael Barlow, 22, was arrested in Fort Liberty on January 6th on charges of abetting the commission of the first-degree murder of Donald Calder Jr. This was announced by the Wake Forest Police Department. In a statement.
According to an arrest warrant issued Jan. 5 and obtained by The Post, Barlow allegedly attempted to hire a hitman to kill Calder on Nov. 28, 2023.
The same day he tried to hire the hitman, Barlow purchased an AR-15 Springfield rifle along with a second gun, prosecutors said Monday. According to WRAL.
He had also requested a transfer in the Army to a post near Calder.
“Mr. Calder was involved in a fatal motor vehicle crash along Capital Boulevard/US 1 in Wake Forest that claimed the life of Mr. Barlow's mother, Michelle,” WFPD said in a statement.
On March 22, 2016, Calder was driving a dump truck when he failed to slow down and crashed into the back of Michelle Barlow's minivan, killing the mother of two.
A 29-year-old man was arrested and charged with vehicular manslaughter causing death.
He pleaded guilty 10 months later and was given a 12-month suspended sentence.
Authorities believe driver fatigue and distraction contributed to the fatal crash. According to WRAL.
Barlow, who was at Fort Liberty for training with the North Carolina National Guard, is a member of the 130th Maneuver Enhanced Brigade and has been a Guard member since 2019, the newspaper reported.
He was taken into custody by the U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Division and then turned over to Wake Forest Police.
Barlow was charged with a first-degree felony and is being held in the Wake County Detention Center on $1 million bail, according to police and jail records.
The man who tried to hire Barlow called the police and no charges were filed.
At his first court appearance Monday, a judge ordered Barlow to remain in jail on $1 million bail and undergo a mental health evaluation, according to court documents.
A disposition hearing in his case is scheduled for January 29.
In April, a Tennessee Air National Guard member was arrested after volunteering to be a hitman on a fake website.
Josiah Ernesto Garcia, 21, was charged with interstate murder-for-hire using a fake hitman website called Rentahitman.com.
