SACRAMENTO, California — Shaminderjit Singh Sandhu, a 52-year-old from Tracy, was sentenced to seven and a half years in prison for conspiring to use interstate commerce facilities in the commission of murder-for-hire, according to U.S. Attorney Eric Grant. Sandhu, along with Jagninder Singh Boparai, 49, of Manteca, and Ramesh Kumar Birla Jr., 47, of Dublin, plotted to murder a victim identified as Victim 2.
In February 2023, Boparai met with a person he believed to be a hitman at a Starbucks in Manteca. Unbeknownst to Boparai and his co-defendants, the hitman was actually a confidential informant working for the FBI. Boparai initially offered $6,000 for the assault of another man, and later, in March 2023, provided a $1,000 down payment for the job, according to court documents.
The informant later presented Boparai with a staged photo of the supposed assault victim, which Boparai approved. Boparai then discussed two additional jobs, including a robbery and making a person “disappear.” In March 2023, Boparai met with the informant again, offering $10,000 as a down payment for the murder-for-hire plot. Sandhu provided the victim’s address and instructed that the victim must disappear without leaving evidence…