The husband of the late seller Brent Sikkema—who was murdered at his house in Rio de Janeiro on 14 January 2024—has been charged with hiring a person to kill him. Officers from the Division of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and US legal professional’s workplace in Manhattan introduced 4 expenses on Tuesday (11 February) towards Daniel Sikkema, together with one rely of murder-for-hire conspiracy leading to loss of life and one rely of conspiracy to homicide and maim an individual out of the country; he faces a most penalty of life in jail or loss of life.
Brent Sikkema was discovered lifeless at his house within the Jardim Botânico neighbourhood of Rio on 15 January 2024, with 18 stab wounds. On the time he was 75 years previous and within the midst of a bitter divorce dispute with Daniel Sikkema, with whom he had been married for greater than a decade and had a teenaged son. Days after the homicide, a suspect was arrested. Two months later, Brent Sikkema was arrested in New York amid suspicions that he was concerned in his husband’s homicide. On the time he was charged with passport fraud; Tuesday’s superseding indictment provides three extra expenses.
“Within the midst of a tense divorce, Daniel Sikkema allegedly financed the untimely loss of life of his estranged husband,” James E. Dennehy, the assistant director in control of the FBI’s New York subject workplace, mentioned in an announcement. “The defendant allegedly employed a hitman to facilitate the worldwide homicide of his husband, and tried to hide his involvement on this callous plan.”
In keeping with the costs, Brent Sikkema allegedly employed the person who has been accused of finishing up the homicide—known as “CC-1” within the indictment, however recognized as Alejandro Triana Prevez by Brazilian police. Sikkema allegedly organized for a $5,000 cost to Prevez following the homicide, promising additional cost to comply with.
In an announcement to The New York Occasions a lawyer representing Daniel Sikkema, Richard Levitt, mentioned his consumer “now as at all times maintains his innocence and appears ahead to his full vindication at trial”.
In a separate submitting final month, the executor of Brent Sikkema’s property, a person named James T.H. Deaver, filed a wrongful loss of life lawsuit towards Daniel Sikkema in New York State Supreme Courtroom. That criticism outlines in grim element the circumstances of Brent Sikkema’s loss of life and the alleged communications between Daniel Sikkema and Prevez main as much as and instantly following the killing—together with that Prevez used cash allegedly despatched to him by Daniel Sikkema to buy a crossbow that he initially deliberate to make use of within the homicide, although he allegedly opted to make use of a kitchen knife. Deaver is in search of to get well losses and damages suffered by Brent Sikkema’s property because of the homicide, together with assist because of the couple’s minor son.
Brent Sikkema was born in 1948 and raised in Illinois. After attending the San Francisco Artwork Institute, he was employed because the exhibitions director on the Visible Research Workshop in Rochester, New York in 1971. He labored at Imaginative and prescient Gallery in Boston between 1976 and 1989. After relocating to New York Metropolis in 1981, he based his personal up to date artwork gallery in Soho, then known as Wooster Gardens.
The gallery moved to Chelsea in 1999 and later modified its identify to Sikkema Jenkins & Co, with Michael Jenkins changing into a associate in 2003. The gallery now referred to as Sikkema Jenkins Malloy is one in all New York’s most distinguished galleries and has labored with artists together with Jeffrey Gibson, Sheila Hicks, Vik Muniz, Kara Walker and Louis Fratino.
