The individual suspected of murdering Cash App founder Bob Lee was found guilty on Tuesday.
Nima Momeni, a 40-year-old tech consultant, murdered Lee on April 4, 2023. His defense team argued that the killing was an accidental case of self-defense, while the prosecution insisted that it was a premeditated act.
The jury sided with the prosecution, convicting Momeni of second-degree murder.
A San Francisco jury on Tuesday found a tech consultant guilty of second-degree murder in the stabbing death of Cash App founder Bob Lee, which carries a sentence of 16 years to life.
Jurors took seven days to deliver their verdict against Nima Momeni in the April 4, 2023, death of Lee, a beloved tech mogul who was found staggering on a deserted downtown street, dripping a trail of blood and calling for help. Lee, 43, later died at a hospital.
“We think justice was done here today,” the victim’s brother, Tim Oliver Lee, told reporters. “What matters today is that we had a guilty verdict and Nima Momeni is going away for a very long time.”
Prosecutors said Momeni planned the attack on Lee, driving him to an isolated spot under the Bay Bridge and stabbing him three times with a knife he took from his sister’s kitchen. They say Momeni was angry with Lee for introducing his younger sister to a drug dealer she says gave her GHB and other drugs and then sexually assaulted her.
But Momeni testified on the stand that Lee was the one who attacked him with a knife, angry after the tech consultant chided him about spending more time with his family instead of searching for a strip club that night. Momeni, who studies martial arts, claimed self-defense and said he didn’t realize he had fatally wounded Lee or that Lee was even hurt.
The prosecution focused on Momeni’s anger over Lee’s relationship with his sister, Khazar Elyasssnia. He allegedly questioned the Cash App founder earlier in the evening about whether his sister had been “doing drugs or anything inappropriate.”
His sister sent a text message to Lee that was obtained by CNN. “Just wanted to make sure your doing ok Cause I know nima came wayyyyyy down hard on you. Thank you for being such a slassy man handling it with class,” she wrote.
Momeni’s defense team painted a drastically different picture. His lawyers claimed that Lee was under the influence of narcotics and behaved aggressively, which sparked the altercation. “Bob Lee’s system was like the Walgreen’s of recreational drugs,” said defense attorney Paula Canny, suggesting that the drugs pushed Lee to become aggressive.
The defense pointed out that Lee had used a knife earlier in the evening to snort cocaine, which was captured on surveillance footage. They argued that it was the same knife used in the incident and that Lee attacked Momeni first.
The defendant testified that he made a sarcastic remark about Lee, which kicked off an argument. “I made a bad joke,” he said, according to Fox News. “I said if it was my last night in town, I’d go hang out with my family instead of f------ around in strip clubs. It set him off. He just blew up in front of me.”
Elyassnia also testified that Lee was deeply into drugs. “He was all over the place. Aggressive,” she said.
However, the prosecution told the jury that Momeni had lured Lee to the location where the incident happened with the intent to murder him. The defendant is scheduled to be sentenced on January 15, 2025.
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