Scottsdale, Arizona: Two Men Get Life in Prison in Murder-for-Hire Killing of Mobile Barber

A California man has been sentenced to life in prison for arranging the killing of a Scottsdale mobile barber who was shot outside his converted school bus barbershop in January 2022, the Maricopa County Attorney's Office announced on Monday.

Robert Celifie was found guilty in August of first-degree murder, conspiracy and burglary in the death of Ilya Shimonov. Shimonov, known to his customers as Mike the Barber, cut hair from a small used school bus he had converted into a mobile shop, driving the barbershop to clients around Scottsdale.

Shot after a haircut

On January 3, 2022, Shimonov had just finished a haircut at his bus near Brown Avenue and Third Avenue, close to a Scottsdale hotel, when gunfire broke out at about 8 p.m. FOX 10 Phoenix reported that he was shot nine times. Three witnesses had photographed a man waiting at the doors of the bus moments before the shooting. The gunman fled with Shimonov's cellphone.

A stolen phone led investigators across three states

Police tracked the stolen phone from Scottsdale to Las Vegas and then to Los Angeles. A license plate reader captured a white Mercedes passing at the same time as the phone, and the car was registered to Celifie. Investigators say Chaze Cable drove the Mercedes to Arizona to carry out the killing. Celifie was detained days later in Henderson, Nevada, and officers found the murder weapon inside his girlfriend's home.

The search stretched across state lines. Investigators executed 48 search warrants, reviewed surveillance footage from dozens of locations and worked through terabytes of collected data. Police agencies in Arizona, Nevada, California, Texas and Arkansas assisted Scottsdale police with the arrests.

Messages read aloud at a press conference

On Monday, officials read Signal messages the two men exchanged on December 31, 2021. In the messages, Celifie sent Cable a picture of the mobile shop and said the man needed a visit and that they wanted his phones. On January 3, 2022, Cable asked where the act should happen, and Celifie answered with the address of the bus. He told Cable to take the phone and, in his words, "do your thing after he done with that cut," and then meet him at the Orleans hotel.

Life sentences for both men

Cable was convicted in 2025 of premeditated first-degree murder, conspiracy and burglary and was sentenced to life in prison. With Celifie's sentencing on Monday, both men are now serving life sentences.

Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell said that through his actions Celifie condemned the victim to death just the same, even though he was not the person who fired the gun. She credited Scottsdale police and prosecutor Richard Dusterhoft with the case.

Shimonov's mother said her world collapsed when her son was killed. "When this horrible event happened, my world collapsed. I don't think it will ever be the same," she said, thanking everyone who worked on the case.

Investigators say they believe the cellphone was the target of the plot. They say there is no evidence Shimonov and Celifie knew each other, although the two men had acquaintances in common in Arizona, and the motive for the killing remains unclear.