Mum had husband killed for insurance money, but wasn't the beneficiary

A US mother has been convicted of murder and conspiracy after having her husband killed in order to collect his life insurance payout.

Uloma Curry-Walker, 45, had been married to Cleveland firefighter William Walker for four months when she asked her then-17-year-old daughter and her daughter's boyfriend to find someone to kill him in 2013.

According to prosecutors, she was tens of thousands of dollars in debt at the time from credit cards and loans and had begun plotting Walker’s death so she could access his AU$131,000 insurance.

However, there was a flaw in the newlywed's plan: Walker hadn’t yet finalised switching the beneficiary on his insurance policy to her name, and consequently his ex-wife received the payout in the months after his death.

During her trial, it emerged Curry-Walker had given Chad Padgett, her daughter's boyfriend, a down payment of AU$1300 to have Walker killed. Cleveland.com reports Padgett initially went to his cousin Chris Hein, who botched his first assassination attempt in October 2013. A second killer, Ryan Dorty, was then arranged.

On the night of November 3 2013, Walker was ambushed after arriving home from McDonald’s run. He had gone to collect food for Curry-Walker while they packed up their belongings to move house. The firefighter was shot four times as he unlocked his car near the couple’s driveway, and Curry-Walker called police soon afterwards.

Padgett, Hein, Dorty and Curry-Walker's daughter all pleaded guilty and testified against her in court.

Curry-Walker was convicted on Friday - what would have been her four-year anniversary with Walker - of charges including aggravated murder and conspiracy, and now faces a maximum of life in jail. She will be sentenced on August 8.