Woman charged in death scheme

State police arrest their fifth suspect in space-cult plot; Investigation continues

Baltimore Sun/October 21, 2001
By Jason Song

A fifth person has been arrested and charged in a murder-for-hire plot allegedly desiged to eliminate critics of a space-alien cult, Maryland State Police said yesterday.

Amy C. Dardick of the 100 block of Masters Court in Westminster was arrested at 6:15 p.m. Friday after police stopped her Lexus on Tahoma Farm Road. No bond was set at a hearing yesterday morning in Carroll County District Court, and she was taken to the Carroll County Detention Center.

State police accused Dardick, 39, of conspiring with four other members of a cult led by Scott Caruthers to kill Dardick's ex-husband, Lewis Dardick. Lewis Dardick had hired a private investigator to look into the cult and successfully sued to regain custody of the couple's children, police said.

Authorities were led to Amy Dardick after charging four other cult members this month with conspiring to murder Lewis Dardick and three other men. Cult members allegedly offered Caruthers' bodyguard, Amir Tabassi, about $100,000 in stock to commit the killings.

Tabassi, who received jewelry as a down payment, instead reported the plan to authorities, police said.

After the four arrests, state police searched Caruthers' home, where they found papers and computers that also implicated Amy Dardick in the plot, police said.

Caruthers, claimed he was a space alien working for the government and would someday save his followers from devastating shifts in the Earth's crust.

Police are continuing their investigation, a department spokesman said yesterday.