May 20, 2022
In one of the stranger and more complex cases to be recorded, police in Ontario Canada, are still searching for an Iranian-Canadian women who was kidnaped from a private home in January and has not been seen or heard from in the more than four months since.
But it’s not just a kidnaping case. There is also a separate assault case and a third case of an ex-boyfriend harassing her. Whether they are linked or completely separate remains to be determined.
Elnaz Hajtamiri, 37, was born in Iran but has lived in Canada for the last four years, since becoming a widow in Iran. Hajtamiri first came to media attention December 20, when two men attacked her with a frying pan in the parking garage of her condo in Richmond Hill, a suburb of Toronto that is packed with Iranian-born residents. It took 40 stitches to patch up the head wound, according to media reports at the time.
A passerby in the garage saw the attack and intervened, at which point the two male attackers fled in a car. Next, the police charged her ex-boyfriend, Mohamad Lilo, 34, a Montreal resident, with harasing her. He was scheduled to appear in court in February, but that hearing has since been postponed. Hajtamiri told friends she was fearful and moved from Richmond Hill to a small resort town on the shores of Georgian Bay an extension of Lake Huron to live with relatives there. In the third and most serious case, on the night of January 12, three black males came to that house claiming to be police officers and asserting that they had a warrant for Hajtamiri’s arrest, which was false.
They subdued the homeowner when he became suspicious and tried to call 9-1- 1. They then dragged a barefoot Hajtamiri from the house bound and gagged through the snow. She comes from a wealthy family and much speculation centered on a possible kidnaping for ransom. But the weeks go by and there has been no ransom demand. There has been no word of any kind from the kidnapers. In fact, there were no known developments until April 14, when the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) announced they had arrested a man with an Asian Indian name in connection with the frying pan attack in December and were seeking a second man with an Indian name.
They released photos of both men. But police acknowledge they are no closer to locating Hajtamiri, in a case that has baffled investigators. “I have never, never come across a case like this,” OPP Detective Inspector Martin Graham told reporters in mid-April. They have not determined a motive. They also have not located the white Lexus SUV used in the abduction January 12, nor have they identified its owner. But they say they believe the December assault in the parking garage and the January kidnaping are linked.
They have not said whether they think the ex-boy friend is linked to the two crimes. “My biggest hope is that Elnaz is alive,” said Graham. “My greatest fear is that she is not.” Police took the “extraordinary” step of reaching out to the Iranian community in Toronto and Montreal as they expanded the scope of their search, and are even contemplating the possibility that she has been taken out of the country. Adding to the mystery, two tracking devices were found attached under her car when she brought the vehicle in for servicing in November before the frying pan attack.
The CBC said a source told it that a third tracking device was found later inside the car by the police. After that December attack, Hajtamiri feared for her safety and moved in with family in the town of Wasaga Beach, 145 kilometers (90 miles) north of Toronto.
The only time she reportedly left the beachfront community was January 10, to retrieve her vehicle, computer and mobile phone from police, who had been searching them for further tracking devices On April 14, York Region police (the force that covers the Greater Toronto area and includes Richmond Hill) announced the arrest of Riyasat Singh in connection with the assault at the parking garage. Singh, 23, faces four charges, including attempted kidnaping and attempted murder.
Police also issued a Canada-wide warrant for the arrest of Harshdeep Binner, also 23, who faces the same charges. The names are Hindu or Sikh in origin. Both men are Ontario residents. The car they fled the garage in was stolen and was later located in a parking space. It is possible fingerprints were found in the car they led them to the man they arrested and the other man charged.
But the police said the kidnaping charges do not involve Hajtamiri’s seizure in January; rather they are related to the frying pan attack. “We have at least five different people responsible directly for these crimes,” said Graham, apparently referring to the two white males who attacked Hajtamiri with the frying pan and the three black males who took her from the resort town on Georgian Bay. “Despite the number of people involved, we have received no information that would provide us with a definite link as to where the investigation should be headed.”
On January 21, police arrested Hajtamiri’s former boyfriend Mohamad Lilo, charging him with criminal harassment of Hajtamiri. He was freed four days later and is still awaiting a court appearance. The two broke up in October, but he tried to contact her the next month and police become involved. Officers would not say if he is a suspect in her abduction, but said they are investigating the relationship, which they said was both personal and professional. They also said that a condition of his bail was that he go nowhere near Hajtamiri.
The family name Lilo is most commonly found in Iraq, Albania and on several Pacific islands. But it exists in many other cultures. It is even found in Germany where it has a long history as a Christian name. The police have not given Lilo’s ethnicity or birthplace. Some analysts reviewing the case have questioned why the police failed to give Hajtamiri full protection, given that the tracking devices indicated she was being surveilled by someone and the frying pan attack indicated she was under threat.
They said it was a bad idea for her to go to a remote town where the local police were not even informed of her case let alone asked to keep track of her. Hajtamiri, who also goes by the abbreviated surname Tamiri, emigrated to Canada less than four years ago, after she lost her husband. The five-foot-three (160-centimeter) woman recently started her own cake-making company after leaving an import-export business.
In their latest push for new information, police released a video of Fariba Hajtamiri, Elnaz’s mother, pleading in Farsi for her daughter’s release. Fariba, who lives in Iran, said the family’s life has become “desperate” as they hope for Elnaz’s release. “We desperately need your help,” she said. “I beg you as a mother to guide us and tell us anything you know. Please, I beg of you.”
The police are circulating information about the case in the Persian and Arab communities of Ontario, believing that some people in those communities have information that would help the police.