Bob Lee’s ex-wife ripped Khazar Momeni Wednesday on the fourth day of her testimony in the murder trial of her brother, Nima Momeni, accused of killing the technology executive and founder of Cash App in San Francisco in April.
After her cross-examination by defense attorneys on Tuesday, prosecutors on Wednesday highlighted Khazar Momeni’s earlier testimony, which said she had received harassing messages from Lee’s family in the days after the killing. Prosecutors showed a screenshot of a text message exchange between Lee’s ex-wife Krista Lee and a friend, in which she asked the friend if he wanted to “play detective” by looking for Khazar Momeni – who she referred to with a slur.
Krista Lee’s text message also claimed that San Francisco police had “difficulty locating” her.
Khazar Momeni said on Wednesday that she received a screenshot of the exchange from one of her friends, to whom the screenshot was also forwarded, and said she felt the exchange was threatening to her.
Krista and Bob Lee were married until 2019 and have two children. During a hearing earlier this month Nima Momeni’s lawyers had tried to exclude Krista Lee from court proceedingsciting possible witness tampering.
A lawsuit filed by the defense argued that Krista Lee “played detective” on many occasions and has no intention of stopping.
As on other days of the trial, Krista Lee was in the courtroom again on Wednesday and as she left the courtroom she berated Khazar Momeni for her three days of testimony about Lee, their relationship and his death.
“My husband was murdered. She has no right to make our – she has no right to make herself a victim of this when our family was the one that was murdered,” Krista Lee said. “She can fuck herself.”
KPIX
Bob Lee was stabbed to death in the early morning of April 4, 2023 in San Francisco’s upscale Rincon Hill/East Cut neighborhood. Prosecutors allege Nima Momeni killed Lee with a kitchen knife after a confrontation over Khazar Momeni’s relationship with Lee and their alleged drug use. Nima Momeni has pleaded not guilty and his defense team claims he killed Lee in self-defense after a drug-addicted Lee came after him.
The shocking murder of the well-known tech entrepreneur in San Francisco was initially seized upon by critics as another high-profile example of street violence plaguing the city. In the days that followed, the story focused on the drug-fueled underground party scene frequented by members of Silicon Valley’s elite, including reportedly Bob Lee and Khazar Momeni, who is married to a prominent San Francisco plastic surgeon.
Earlier Wednesday in the prosecution’s referral, San Francisco Assistant District Attorney Dane Reinstedt pointed out the differences in Khazar Momeni’s answers about text exchanges between her and her brother depending on which attorneys asked the questions.
Reinstedt again asked Momeni about the text messages she sent to her brother Nima in the hours after Bob Lee’s murder, calling him “psychotic” and “crazy.” When asked about the text messages last week, Khazar Momeni said she did not remember the text messages and that she did not remember much of that day because of her drug use and fear of Lee’s death.
On Tuesday during cross-examination by the defense, Khazar Momeni testified that those texts were not about Lee, but about his acquaintance Jeremy Boivin. who she claimed in a testimony supplied her with the drugs GSB and LSD and claimed he sexually assaulted her while she was incapacitated. Boivin’s lawyer disputes her story.
Dane Reinstedt: “When the lawyers you pay asked about the same messages… those messages were not about Bob, not about how your brother reacted to the possible rape, but about Mr. Boivin who was in your apartment the next day?”
Khazar Momeni: “Yes.”
DR: “That’s a completely different answer.”
KM: “I try not to lie. I tell the truth. My brother was very angry with me.”
After Khazar Momeni concluded her testimony on Wednesday, the prosecutor then called a former BMW San Francisco employee who testified that the Momeni family had tried to sell Nima Momeni’s white BMW sedan on May 6, 2023, about three weeks after his arrest.
The witness said he had not had the car cleaned or modified and was told by police that the vehicle was part of an investigation.
Under cross-examination by the defense, the witness said he knew Momeni, who he said had visited the dealership several times for maintenance on his vehicle.
The defense suggested that the Momeni family tried to sell the vehicle to cover the costs of Nima’s legal fees.
The vehicle was seized and towed by SFPD officers who testified that the car was “parked front and center in the parking lot.”
