New York — A federal judge has sentenced a man who planned to kill an Iranian-American writer on behalf of Tehran to a maximum of 15 years in prison, after he heard the woman who was targeted describe multiple attempts on her life as threats against all Americans.
Judge Louis J. Lehman wrote of written conversations Carlisle Rivera had when he was planning to kill the journalist and human rights defender Masih Alinejad In Brooklyn in 2024, it was “chilling” and caused “great harm” to her and her husband.
Addressing the court, the couple described how assassination plots forced them to limit interaction with their children, as they frequently changed their residences and avoided relentless threats from Iran.
“I am just a woman,” Alinejad said. “My weapon is my voice. My weapon is my social media.”
She urged the judge to issue Rivera the maximum sentence to send a message to anyone who “targets American citizens on American soil” and to “protect defenseless people like me who now face massacre in my country.”
Alinejad said that people in Iran “face guns and bullets… to protect global security,” including American security.
Before the verdict was announced, Rivera, 51, told the judge: “I am deeply sorry for my actions.”
Outside the federal courthouse in Manhattan, Alinejad said the United States must be careful not to allow the indiscriminate killings taking place in Iran to spread to the United States. As she spoke, she held up a tablet computer and showed reporters videos of the body bags of some of the thousands of Iranians killed during recent protests.
Alinejad said she hopes President Donald Trump will go after Iran Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei Just like the Venezuelan president did Nicolas Madurowho was arrested in a US military raid in January and brought to face drug trafficking charges in New York. He has pleaded not guilty.
Alinejad said: “I call on President Trump. Take action. Expelling terrorists is not a tragedy. It is a sign of justice.” But she added that she did not want to bomb Iran, but only remove its leaders.
She noted that the US authorities said that the Iranian Revolutionary Guard was responsible not only for multiple plots against her life but also a conspiracy against Trump.
Alinejad left Iran in 2009 after the country’s disputed presidential election and moved to the United States, where she launched online campaigns encouraging Iranian women to take photos and videos showing their hair in defiance of the religious rule requiring the wearing of the hijab.
Author and contributor to Voice of America and CBS News, Alinejad became a citizen in 2019. She has traveled around the world speaking to women and encouraging others to join her movement for women’s freedom of expression, especially those in Iran.
Last year, she testified in the trial of two men accused of planning to kidnap her from her Brooklyn home and kill her in 2022. The prosecutor said Iran had put a $500,000 bounty on her head. The defendants, both citizens of Azerbaijan, were convicted He was sentenced to 25 years in prison.
In November 2024, the Justice Department accused Tehran of allowing a murder-for-hire plot Against Trump Days before he won the elections. An Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman reportedly denied the allegations. The authorities said that the person who tried to hire assassins to pursue Trump was the one who organized the conspiracy against Alinejad.
Intelligence officials said Iran opposes Trump’s reelection. The first Trump administration It ended the nuclear agreement with IranHe reimposed sanctions and ordered The killing of Iranian General Qassem SoleimaniThis is the measure that prompted Iran’s leaders to do so Vow of revenge.
In court on Wednesday, the prosecutor said Rivera was supposed to monitor Alinejad’s scheduled appearance in February 2024 at Fairfield University in Connecticut, an event that was cancelled. Then, according to court papers, Rivera tried for months to monitor Alinejad at a home in Brooklyn where she no longer lived.
During a break, Alinejad approached Rivera’s fiancée, who cried as she hugged Alinejad, and told her: “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
Outside the courtroom afterward, Alinejad said she told the woman: “I said, ‘I’m fighting for you, I’m fighting for all Americans…’ when I asked President Trump to try to catch the killers.”