February 21, 2025
A grand jury in New York has indicted a brigadier general in the Pasdaran and three other Iranians for plotting the murder of dissident Masih Alinejad, bringing to eight the number of people charged in a regime scheme to shut her up by kidnaping or killing her. But the four just indicted are all believed living in Iran and beyond the reach of the US justice system.
Brig. Gen. Ruhollah Bazghandi and the three others Haj Taher, Hossein Sedighi and Seyed Mohammad Forouzan are all accused of recruiting career criminals to kill Alinejad, a plot that was foiled when the designated killer was stopped for a traffic offense near Alinejad’s Brooklyn home and found with a loaded rifle.
Four others were previously indicted in the plot. They are Rafat Amirov, Polad Omarov, Zialat Mamedov and Khalid Mehdiyev. Amirov is Iranian, Omarov is Czech, Mamedov is Georgian and Mehdiyev, the arrested gunman, is Azerbaijani.
Mamedov is in jail in the Republic of Georgia awaiting trial for an unrelated alleged crime. The other three are all in detention in New York awaiting trial in the Alinejad case.