Three individuals, including one Iranian and two Canadian nationals, have been indicted in a grim murder-for-hire plot that aimed to take out two Maryland residents. U.S. authorities have unfolded a sinister narrative involving encrypted communications, overseas plotting, and meticulous assassination planning on American soil.
The trio, identified as Naji Sharifi Zindashti, 49, Damion Patrick John Ryan, 43, and Adam Richard Pearson, 29, allegedly conspired from December 2020 through March 2021 to execute the murder scheme. According to an indictment revealed by the U.S. Department of Justice, the defendants used "SkyECC," an encrypted messaging service, to map out the logistics and coordinate with potential hitmen to carry out the murders in Maryland. The two targets, previous Iranian residents, had sought safety in the U.S. after one defected from Iran. In response to these criminal endeavors, the Treasury Department has struck Zindashti's network, targeting his capability to transact within the United States, as per U.S. Attorney's Office, District of Minnesota.
"To those in Iran who plot murders on U.S. soil and the criminal actors who work with them, let today's charges send a clear message: the Department of Justice will pursue you as long as it takes – and wherever you are – and deliver justice," Assistant Attorney General Matthew G. Olsen said, in a statement obtained by the U.S. Attorney's Office, District of Minnesota.
The three men have been charged with conspiracy to use interstate commerce facilities in the commission of murder-for-hire, and the indictment stresses that an indictment is merely an allegation with all defendants presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law. Zindashti is currently residing in Iran while Ryan and Pearson are incarcerated in Canada on unrelated charges. The FBI is closely collaborating with the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to unravel this international criminal case.
