Trial Set for Men Accused of Targeting Iranian Dissident in New York
First, the Iranian government was accused of trying to lure a journalist and dissident from New York City to Turkey to abduct and imprison her. Then, according to U.S. officials, intelligence agents schemed unsuccessfully to kidnap the woman, Masih Alinejad.
In 2022 came the most audacious attempt to silence Ms. Alinejad, who was born in Iran and has long criticized its government. Prosecutors said figures connected to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps of Iran sent members of the Russian mob to kill her.
The plot, authorities say, was thwarted when police officers stopped an Azerbaijani man who had lurked outside Ms. Alinejad's Brooklyn home and tried to open her door. In his sport utility vehicle, they found an assault rifle with an obliterated serial number, 66 rounds of ammunition and a ski mask.
The men accused of directing the activity in Brooklyn, Rafat Amirov and Polad Omarov, are to stand trial in Federal District Court in Manhattan on Monday, charged with murder for hire and conspiracy. The trial is expected to illustrate the lengths to which Iranian officials will go to retaliate against expatriates, even those living in Western countries, who speak up against the government in Tehran.
'We will not tolerate attempts by a foreign power to threaten, silence or harm Americans,' Merrick B. Garland, the attorney general at the time, said in 2023 when federal officials first detailed the plot against Ms. Alinejad.
Prosecutors are planning to describe how Mr. Amirov and Mr. Omarov operated within a rivalrous, faction-ridden criminal organization known as the Thieves-in-Law, which originated in Stalinist prison camps.
Some insight might come from a former member of the group who prosecutors said participated in the plot against Ms. Alinejad, but will testify for the government as a cooperating witness.
That person has been identified in court papers only as 'CW-1,' but details of his actions match some of those ascribed to Khalid Mehdiyev, the Azerbaijani man who was arrested outside Ms. Alinejad's house. An indictment that charged Mr. Amirov, Mr. Omarov and several others who remain at large did not list Mr. Mehdiyev, who lived in Yonkers, N.Y., at the time of his arrest, as a defendant.
The cooperating witness will testify about statements by Mr. Amirov while both were in a federal jail in Brooklyn following the failed attempt on Ms. Alinejad's life, prosecutors wrote, including one that the contract for killing her was worth $500,000. Prosecutors also wrote that they would present 'substantial electronic communications' documenting the murder plot that were found in Mr. Omarov's cloud accounts and devices.
Before trying to kill Ms. Alinejad, prosecutors wrote, Mr. Omarov and Mr. Mehdiyev had participated in several kidnapping and murder plots overseas, aiming to enrich themselves and to strengthen their standing within the Russian mob.
The two had been involved in extorting an ethnic Azeri grocery store owner in Brooklyn in 2022, prosecutors said, when Mr. Omarov told Mr. Mehdiyev he had a better assignment — killing Ms. Alinejad — that could lead to additional lucrative jobs.
Ms. Alinejad had worked in Iran as a journalist but wrote in The New York Times that she was forced to leave the country in 2009. Since then, Ms. Alinejad, who hosts a program called 'Tablet' on Voice of America Persian, a U.S. government-owned broadcaster, has been a sharp critic of the Iranian government. She is known for starting a campaign in 2014 against compulsory hijab laws in Iran and inviting women to wear white scarves in protest.
In 2018, according to court papers, Iranian officials offered to pay Ms. Alinejad's relatives in Iran to invite her to Turkey, with the apparent goal of bringing her to Iran for imprisonment. The relatives refused and the next year one was sentenced to eight years in prison, court papers said, based on purported support for Ms. Alinejad's advocacy.
Two years later, Iranian operatives, including an intelligence official named Alireza Shavaroghi Farahani, were accused of conspiring to kidnap Ms. Alinejad. Prosecutors said that the plotters had used a live, high-definition video feed of her home. An indictment described a plan that included the potential use of speedboats to spirit Ms. Alinejad away from New York City, followed by an ocean voyage to Venezuela, whose leadership has friendly relations with the Iranian government.
The idea to kill Ms. Alinejad in Brooklyn originated soon after the kidnapping plot fell apart, according to prosecutors, and was initiated by a network in Iran led by Ruhollah Bazghandi, a brigadier general in the Revolutionary Guards. He and three other Iranian men who are not in U.S. custody have been charged in Manhattan with murder for hire.
Members of the Bazghandi network turned to Mr. Amirov, a citizen of Azerbaijan and Russia who was then living in Iran, an indictment said, and he in turn contacted Mr. Omarov, a Georgian living in Eastern Europe. They provided $30,000 to Mr. Mehdiyev, according to an indictment, and he bought the assault rifle and began staking out Ms. Alinejad's home.
His surveillance lasted about a week, an indictment said, with Mr. Mehdiyev telling Mr. Omarov at one point that he was 'at the crime scene.' The two men exchanged ideas about how to draw Ms. Alinejad to her door, the indictment said, and Mr. Mehdiyev sent a video showing the assault rifle to Mr. Omarov, along with the message: 'We are ready.'
On that day, it seems, Ms. Alinejad was more prepared than the man sent to kill her.
According to an affidavit by an F.B.I. agent, Mr. Mehdiyev lingered outside Ms. Alinejad's home for hours, at one point ordering food to be delivered to his vehicle, and tried to open Ms. Alinejad's front door. She slipped from the premises, apparently without encountering Mr. Mehdiyev. He drove away about 15 minutes later and was observed by police officers who had arrived after Ms. Alinejad reported suspicious activity to the F.B.I.
While being watched, Mr. Mehdiyev drove through a stop sign, the agent wrote. That infraction provided a reason for the police to pull him over and discover that his driver's license was suspended. Mr. Mehdiyev was arrested and a search of his vehicle turned up the rifle. Soon after that, he was charged with possessing a firearm with an obliterated serial number.
In jail in Brooklyn, Mr. Mehdiyev used a contraband phone to let the Thieves-in-Law know that he had been arrested. Word that he was in custody prompted a flurry of communications among the group's members, prosecutors said.
One member sent Mr. Omarov several voice messages saying that Mr. Mehdiyev 'went to kill the journalist' but 'they caught him,' according to prosecutors. Days later. Mr. Omarov was said to have written to Mr. Amirov about Mr. Mehdiyev, saying: 'I hope he will not make trouble for me.'
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