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In a chilling revelation that reads more like a plot from a James Patterson novel, the Justice Department has indicted an Iranian national for allegedly collaborating with members of the Hell’s Angels biker gang to carry out assassinations in Maryland. The story highlights the dangerous intersection of international crime and political espionage.
The cast of characters involves Naji Sharifi Zindashti, an Iranian drug trafficker and two Canadians who are members of the Hells Angels.
The primary figure in this saga is Naji Sharifi Zindashti, an Iranian drug trafficker known as “Big Guy,” who the U.S. Department of Justice alleges has ties to Iran’s intelligence services. Zindashti is accused of orchestrating an assassination plot from Iran, leveraging his connections with two Canadian nationals, Damion Patrick John Ryan and Adam Richard Pearson, identified as members of the notorious Hells Angels biker group.
Two Canadian members of the Hells Angels motorcycle gang plotted with an Iranian drug trafficker to kill a pair of dissidents who were living in Maryland, the Justice Department and federal officials said Monday.
Naji Sharifi Zindashti, aka “Big Guy,” who has ties to Iran’s intelligence services, had been communicating with Damion Patrick John Ryan for a month about various “jobs” when, in January 2021, he brought up “a specific job in the United States,” according to a federal grand jury indictment.
Ryan, who was contacting Zindashti through an “encrypted communication service,” said that it would be “challenging” but that he “might have someone to do it,” the indictment says.
That day, the indictment says, Ryan reached out to Adam Richard Pearson, who said he’d need two to three people, including a driver, and “may charge over $100,000 for the job.”
Ryan replied that he would “get u what you want” but stressed that it needed to be “over kill lol,” U.S. officials said.
The plot, which spanned from December 2020 through March 2021, involved the planning of a brutal killing in which Pearson allegedly indicated that he would instruct the individuals hired for the job to “shoot [the victim] in the head a lot [to] make example” tell them they must ” erase his head from his torso.”
U.S. Attorney Andrew Luger for the District of Minnesota noted that Zindashti and his comrades “used an encrypted messaging service” to orchestrate the plot.
The targets were two Iranian dissidents residing in Maryland. The Treasury Department in a press release explained that Zindashti’s organization regularly carries out these types of missions for the Iranian government.
Zindashti’s network has carried out numerous acts of transnational repression including assassinations and kidnappings across multiple jurisdictions in an attempt to silence the Iranian regime’s perceived critics. The network has also plotted operations in the United States.
This reality provides a stark reminder of how authoritarian governments can extend their reach beyond their own borders.
Fortunately, the plot was thwarted. Now, the Justice Department is charging all three individuals with conspiracy to use interstate commerce facilities in the commission of a murder for hire. The authorities will likely learn quite a bit more about Zindashti’s operations as well as gaining more insight into how these criminal enterprises work because of this case.
