Man engaged in sex acts with 12-year-old in RI, then tried to have her killed, feds say
A man engaged in sex acts with a 12-year-old girl and then offered $200 plus tattoo equipment to have her killed “because she was ‘a witness,’” prosecutors said.
Chandler J. Cardente, now 30, from Rhode Island, pleaded guilty March 20 to enticement of a minor, interstate murder for hire, and commission of a felony while being required to register as a sex offender, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Rhode Island said in a news release.
His attorney declined to comment in a March 21 email to McClatchy News.
Cardente started messaging with the girl in 2021 through social media, telling her he was 17, prosecutors said. Eventually, he met the girl near her middle school and “drove her to various locations in Rhode Island, and engaged in sexual contact with her multiple times,” prosecutors said.
He “was subsequently arrested and detained in state custody,” according to prosecutors.
While behind bars, he asked someone by phone to kill the girl, providing her name and address, prosecutors said. He said, “I need her to end up dead, she’s a witness, she needs to go,” according to a court filing.
Cardente offered $200 in cash, plus $1,500 in tattoo equipment, the filing said.
The person he was talking to was — unbeknownst to Cardente — an undercover law enforcement officer, prosecutors said.
The undercover officer asked Cardente “whether he would be ‘good with it,’ referring to the (girl) being killed” and “(he) responded, ‘It ain’t gonna bother me. I’m gonna go to sleep at night, so, I’m gonna be fine with it. I just need it done…I just need it done before I get indicted,’” according to the court filing.
Cardente is expected to be sentenced federally in April and also is facing state prosecution, per the news release.
He has a separate state conviction for child molestation in 2014, the court filing said.
This story was originally published March 21, 2025 at 6:26 AM with the headline "Man engaged in sex acts with 12-year-old in RI, then tried to have her killed, feds say."
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