UPDATE 6-21-2022: Jennifer Faith was sentenced to life in prison for the murder for hire in her husband's death. According to a release from the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Northern District of Texas, at her sentencing hearing, prosecutors introduced a video of Faith describing the killing to a Dallas detective on the morning of the murder, as well as audio of Faith screaming during the attack and video of her crying hysterically afterwards.
"Ms. Faith put on quite a performance in the wake of her husband's murder. She poured out her sob story to reporters and law enforcement, then headed home to orchestrate her coverup," said U.S. Attorney Chad Meacham. "But crocodile tears didn’t stop the feds. We were committed to getting justice for Jamie, and with the Judge’s imposition of a life sentence this afternoon, we’re one step closer."
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Jennifer Lynne Faith, the 49-year-old Oak Cliff woman who persuaded her boyfriend to shoot her husband to death, has pleaded guilty to orchestrating the murder, according to a February 7 release from the office of U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas Chad E. Meacham.
Faith pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge Jane J. Boyle. She'll be sentenced on May 26, 2022. Since her case was a murder-for-hire, she is eligible for the death penalty. Prosecutors are recommending a sentence of life imprisonment, but sentencing will ultimately be at the discretion of the judge.
Meacham said in a statement that above and beyond the cold-blooded crime, her behavior after the fact made it all the more heinous.
"Even as she wept for her late husband on TV, Ms. Faith was corresponding with his murderer, plotting about how to cover up their crime," Meacham said.
Her husband James Faith was an Information Technology Director for American Airlines. According to plea papers, she admitted that her boyfriend, Darrin Ruben Lopez, 49, gunned him down on October 9, 2020 in front of his home in Oak Cliff.
Lopez has been charged by the state with murder and by federal authorities with a gun crime. He has pleaded not guilty to both charges.
Faith has admitted she created two phony email accounts under the identities of her husband and a friend, which she used to send phony photos to Lopez, to convince him that her husband was physically and sexually abusing her, which was not true.
Lopez suffered a traumatic brain injury while serving in the U.S. Army in Iraq, leaving him disabled. Both before and after the murder, Faith sent him money, gifts, and credit cards which she paid off using the proceeds of a "Support Jennifer Faith" GoFundMe fundraiser launched in the wake of her husband's death.
The murder took place while Faith and her husband walked their dog. Lopez allegedly shot her husband seven times before fleeing in his black Nissan Titan pickup truck, which had a distinctive "T" decal on the back window, which witnesses reported to the police.
After his murder, Jennifer went on TV and pleaded with the public to for help in finding the truck with the decal — then texted Lopez and told him to remove the sticker. Lopez allegedly removed the sticker the following day.
One month after her husband's death, Faith filed a claim with Metropolitan Life Insurance Company seeking approximately $629,000 in death benefits he had through his employer.
The release says that she and Lopez discussed using the money to apply for a residence in her name in Tennessee.
To cover their interactions, she advised Lopez to say he was "an old friend going through a divorce," and the reason they talked every night was because she was supposedly "helping/giving support ... just in case they pulled phone records and ask."
When Lopez was arrested at his home in Tennessee, authorities found the gun used to commit the murder inside his home.
The release also says that, on February 2, 2021, right before she was charged, Faith asked a third party to convey a message to Lopez, who was in custody in Dallas.
"I am with him, will always be with him regardless of whatever has happened," her message said. "I've needed to be cautious because every communication is being monitored. Please tell him ASAP I will always be his."
The investigation was conducted by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives' Dallas Field Division and the Dallas Police Department Homicide Unit, with the assistance of the ATF's Nashville Field Office, the FBI Dallas Field Office, Homeland Security Investigations, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation's Aviation Unit, and the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Middle District of Tennessee. NDTX Assistant U.S. Attorneys Rick Calvert and Andrew Briggs are prosecuting the case.
