AP/Lang
2/9/20
Prison officials say a North Liberty man serving more than 80 years in prison for twice trying to hire a hit man has died behind bars.
Officials say 39-year-old Justin Lee Dewitt died Friday afternoon. Officials have not said how Dewitt died.
Dewitt was sentenced in 2018 to 35 years in prison for a murder-for-hire scheme involving a business associate and that associate’s family. He met with the supposed hitman in a parking lot and gave him a $1,000 down payment. The “hitman” was actually an undercover officer.
The next year, Dewitt was sentenced to another 50 years for trying to organize from behind bars at the Muscatine County Jail the killings of three witnesses from his first case so they couldn’t testify against him. Those witnesses included the inmate who Dewitt initially asked about hiring a hitman, that man’s wife and the officer who set up the first sting.
An autopsy has been ordered in his death.