July 29, 2022
The Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) have charged the former boyfriend of Iranian-Canadian Elnaz Hajtamiri with her kidnapping and attempted murder.
The police, however, have still not located the woman more than six months after she was subdued and dragged barefoot from a house through the snow last January.
The relationship between ex-boyfriend and former business partner Mohammad Lilo, whose age was not available, and Hajtamiri, now 38 if she is alive, ended last October.
Last December 21, Hajtamiri was attacked by two men in the garage of her apartment house in Richmond Hill, just north of Toronto, and beaten with a frying pan. Another man in the garage intervened and the two attackers ran off.
The OPP on July 12 charged Lilo, whose home is in Montreal, with attempted murder and kidnaping for that attack. The two attackers were earlier identified as two Indian-Canadians. Lilo was presumably charged with attempted murder and kidnapping for putting them up to the attack, though the OPP did not explain the connection.
One of the two Indians has been arrested. The other remains at large. Both men had been arrested last year in Alberta for involvement in the theft of 40 Ford F-150 pickup trucks in Edmonton.
A few weeks later, on January 12, Hajtamiri was abducted from the house of a relative where she was staying for safety. She was dragged out of the house by three black men wearing police uniforms who said she was under arrest.
Nine days after she disappeared, the OPP charged Lilo with criminal harassment. His appearance before a judge in that case has been repeatedly postponed without explanation. Police said the charge stemmed from threats Lilo had aimed at Hajtamiri after they broke up.
The case remains baffling because the police say they have no knowledge of what has happened to Hajtamiri. There was even some speculation that she had been removed from Canada and sent abroad.
Police have not given any information about where Lilo originated. The family name Lilo is well-known in Iraq, but also in other countries with no Islamic background.
Hajtamiri was born in Iran and moved to Canada in 2018 after her husband died. She found work in an export-import business, but last year left that job to start her own cake-baking business.
Hajtamiri was described as five-foot-three (160 centimeters) with a slim build and black hair.
