Duo convicted of plotting to murder Iranian author in NYC

The U.S. Department of Justice on Thursday said a federal jury found two Russian mobsters guilty of an unsuccessful murder-for-hire scheme. Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps paid Rafat Amirov and Polad Omarov $500,000 to surveil and murder author and journalist Masih Alinejad, according to the DOJ. Her work has focused on exposing human rights abuses in Iran.

Has she faced threats before? Iranian government agents also previously tried to kidnap Alinejad from her Brooklyn home. Born in Iran, she moved to the United States in 2014. She originally fled to the United Kingdom after Iran’s 2009 election.

How did Alinejad react? In a Thursday X post, Alinejad thanked the FBI and America for saving her life. She said she’d spent three years moving more than 20 times between safe houses in New York. Alinejad called on Trump to dismantle the Khamenei regime.

How did they plot to murder Alinejad?Amirov and Omarov hired a third man to kill Alinejad, but police arrested the third person in 2022 near her house for a traffic violation. Omarov contacted the man’s mother after the arrest and threatened to kill her and her other son if she did not help them locate the arrested man whom they had hired. Authorities arrested the two mobsters soon afterward.