Feds accuse three of plotting to kill Brooklyn-based dissident Iranian journalist

On Friday, the Manhattan federal prosecutor’s office announced a sweeping, multiple-count indictment against three Eastern European gangsters who they said were plotting to kill a Brooklyn-based journalist critical of the authoritarian Iranian regime.

Rafat Amirov, 43, Khalid Mehdiyev, 24, and Polad Omarov, 38, are accused of harassing and repeatedly attempting to kill Iranian dissident Masih Alinejad at her home in July.

The feds say this included an unsuccessful attempt to lure Alinejad out of her house by asking for flowers in her garden. Alinejad, a journalist, writer and human rights activist who has previously been kidnapped by the Iranian government, did not fall for the bait.

“This is the second time in the past two years that this FBI and our partners in the FBI have thwarted plots emanating from Iran to kidnap or kill this victim for the “crime” of exercising the right to free speech, to independent political thought. and stand up for the rights of the oppressed and disenfranchised within Iran,” U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said in Manhattan.

Mehdiyev was arrested in August after allegedly spending at least two days searching Alinejad’s house, peering through her windows and trying to open the door. He was being watched by law enforcement as he drove into a stop sign near her Flatbush home, and the NYPD stopped him with an AK-47, 66 rounds of ammunition, $1,100 in cash and a ski mask, on federal charges. .

Alinejad is not named in the indictment, but a source familiar with the case confirmed she was a victim, as she was in a tweet Friday, saying she learned of the arrests after meeting with 12 FBI agents at the bureau’s headquarters in New York. .

“Let me be clear, I am not afraid for my life, because I knew that murder, murder, hanging, torture, rape is in the DNA of the Islamic Republic, and that is why I came to the United States of America to exercise my right, my freedom words to give a voice to the brave people of Iran who say no to the Islamic Republic,” Alinejad wrote.

Alinejad last year released surveillance footage captured by her Ring doorbell that captured the moment an armed suspect tried to break into her home. The journalist said she lived in three safe houses and that the FBI encouraged her to broadcast videos on social media from different locations so agents could track which posts caught the attention of Iranian intelligence officials.

In July 2021, prosecutors indicted Iran-based Iranian intelligence officer Alireza Shavaroghi Farahani, 50, and four accomplices in an elaborate plot to kidnap Alinejad to place her in an Iranian prison. The feds say they have been spying on her home for months, looking for the best route to the Brooklyn waterfront, where a boat would be waiting for her to ferry her to Venezuela.

Amirov was expected to appear before Judge Colleen McMahon on charges of contract killing and money laundering on Friday. Mehdiyev, who was arrested by the feds on similar charges in July, will appear in federal court in Manhattan on January 31 on new charges. A third person, Omarov, was arrested in the Czech Republic on 4 January. The feds are seeking his extradition. in the USA

FBI Director Christopher Wray said the allegations reflect “how far Iranian actors are willing to go to silence critics, even trying to kill a US citizen on American soil.”