Iranian-American Woman Sentenced to Prison for Plot To Kidnap Journalist

An Iranian-American woman has been sentenced in the United States to four years in prison for funding a plan to kidnap Brooklyn journalist, author and human rights activist Masih Alinejad. Niloufar Bahadorifar, 48, of Irvine, California, pleaded guilty in December to charges including conspiring to violate US sanctions by giving material support to Iran, bank and wire fraud, and money laundering. She was convicted of laundering nearly $500,000 into the United States from Iran that was used to pay for private investigators to conduct surveillance of Alinejad in order to facilitate her kidnapping.

“Bahadorifar provided financial support to a brazen plot intended to kidnap an Iranian human rights activist living in the United States, whom the Iranian government has sought to silence for years,” US attorney for the Southern District of New York Damian Williams said in a statement on Monday. Alinejad has contributed to the US government-funded Voice of America Persian language service and reports on human rights issues in Iran.

Four alleged Iranian agents remain wanted by the FBI in connection with the suspected plot to kidnap Alinejad, who lives in New York, and take her back to Iran. Bahadorifar attorneys noted that she was not convicted on a kidnapping charge and that she was a dupe of the Iranian agents.