WASHINGTON – The Justice Department on Friday charged an Iranian man with a murder-for-hire plot to kill then-candidate Donald Trump and two others in a plot to kill an American journalist critical of Tehran.
The Iranian government instructed these actors to “target our citizens, including President-elect Trump, on U.S. soil and abroad,” Damian Williams, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, said in a news release.
The ministry said the plot was part of Iran’s efforts to avenge the death of Iranian military leader Qasem Soleimani during the Trump administration.
The three charged are Farhad Shakeri of Iran; Carlisle Rivera of Brooklyn, New York; and Jonathan Loadholt, of Staten Island, New York.
According to the indictment, an official with the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, a military and counterintelligence agency designated as a terrorist organization by the first Trump administration, told Shakeri in mid- to late September to focus on surveilling and killing Trump.
Shakeri told the Iranian official that it would “cost a tremendous amount of money,” the complaint alleges, adding that he understood Iran was “willing to spend a lot of money in its effort” to have Trump assassinated.
Around Oct. 7, the Iranian official instructed Shakeri to devise a plan to kill Trump within seven days, he told police in recorded interviews, the complaint said.
The Iranian official warned Shakeri that if he could not come up with an assassination plot within the deadline, the IRGC would “interrupt its plan to kill people.” [Trump] until after the US presidential election,” because the official assessed that Trump “would lose the election and it would be easier to kill people afterward.” [Trump]” the complaint alleges. Shakeri told FBI officials that he had no intention of proposing a plan to kill Trump within the time frame set by the IRGC, the report says.
Shakeri was also assigned to surveil and kill two Jewish Americans living in New York City and target Israeli tourists in Sri Lanka.
Shakeri spoke with federal agents five times since late September, including the day after he was tasked with killing Trump. Shakeri reportedly tried to curry favor with federal investigators to get a reduced sentence for an individual currently in prison in the United States.
Trump communications director Steven Cheung said Friday that the newly elected president is aware of the assassination plot. “Nothing will stop President Trump from returning to the White House and restoring peace to the world,” he said.
Prosecutors allege Shakeri is “an asset of the IRGC” who lives in Tehran and is an Afghan national who immigrated to the US as a child. He was deported from the US around 2008 after serving about 14 years in New York state prisons following a 1994 theft conviction.
They said Rivera was arrested Thursday in Brooklyn and Loadholt in Staten Island. Prosecutors allege they were recruited as part of a criminal network to kill an American journalist known as a strong critic of the Iranian regime and its human rights abuses. Journalist Masih Alinejad identified himself to NBC News as the person targeted.
A search of Loadholt’s cloud account turned up photos of him holding two handguns, and a cloud account for Rivera showed multiple semi-automatic rifles and a shotgun. The two are said to have repeatedly watched Alinejad.
In a post on
“I also learned that the person assigned to kill @realDonaldTrump was also assigned to kill me on US soil,” she wrote. “The alleged killers also stood in front of my house in Brooklyn. I call on the American government and the future president of the United States to be tough on terror.”
“The Islamic Republic understands only one language: the language of pressure,” she wrote. “I came to America to exercise my First Amendment right to freedom of speech. I don’t want to die. I want to fight against tyranny, and I deserve to be safe.”
Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement that there are “few actors in the world that pose as serious a threat to the national security of the United States as Iran. We will oppose the Iranian regime’s efforts to endanger the American people and America’s national security.”
FBI Director Christopher Wray said the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps is “conspiring with criminals and assassins to attack and shoot Americans on American soil, and that simply will not be tolerated.”
Trump survived two assassination attempts while running for president: one in July at a campaign rally and another in September while at one of his golf courses in Florida. In the weeks leading up to the first attempt, the Biden administration had obtained intelligence about an Iranian assassination plot against Trump, leading the Secret Service to step up security around the former president.
Trump was also briefed by US intelligence officials about Iran’s threats to kill him after the September attempt.
The three defendants were charged with murder for hire, conspiracy to commit murder for hire and money laundering. The charge carries a maximum sentence of 40 years in prison.
It is believed Shakeri found his co-defendants by tapping into a network of criminal associates he met while in prison in New York.
Shakeri was also charged with conspiracy to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization, providing material support to a terrorist organization, and conspiracy to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and sanctions against the Iranian government. These charges carry a total of up to 60 years in prison.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
