The sentences handed down also got smaller as they went down the line, with the exception of hitman number two, who caught a break

Ahandful of hitmen who kept trying to pay someone else to do their job wound up in jail after one of the paid killers, feeling cheated, got the police involved. The man who hired them was also busted.

The intended target appears to be fine.

The comedy of errors began when Chinese businessman Tan Youhui paid an assassin roughly $283,000 (about N87 million) to kill a rival with whom he was involved in a real estate lawsuit, according to the UK’s Metro news.

Rather than shooting the man he was paid to kill, that hitman outsourced the job to another hitman, whom he reportedly agreed to pay about $141,500 (about N51 million). That hitman then contracted a fourth hitman to do the job for $38,000 (about N14million) upfront and another $71,000 (about N26 million) when the gig was done. He, too, opted to hire someone else to do his dirty work That hired gun, reportedly upset about his arrangement with the fourth hitman, went to the police.

Following a three-year trial in the Chinese city of Nanning, near the Vietnamese border, all five hitmen were convicted of attempted murder.

The sentences handed down also got smaller as they went down the line, with the exception of hitman number two, who caught a break.

Metro news, citing a Chinese publication, identified the first gunman as Xi Guangan. He was sentenced to 42 months in prison. Hitman number two, ID’d as Mo Tianxiang, got 36 months.

Hitmen number three and four, Yang Kangsheng and Yang Guansheng respectively, each got 39 months

Hitman number five, Ling Xiansi, will serve two years and seven months for his involvement.

Businessman Youhui was sentenced to five years behind bars for getting the whole mess started. His business rival does not appear to have been inconvenienced by the botched caper.