This trial now has its own pizza connection.
Bungling hitman Khalid Mehdiyev admitted in court today that instead of a cool, collected, globe-trotting assassin, he was actually just a guy who worked at a pizza joint — and that might explain the raft of errors he made when he tried to clip an exiled Iranian-American journalist in Brooklyn three years ago.
“As you’re coordinating an international kidnapping, you’re also working at a pizza shop?” Elena Fast, defense attorney for one of Mehdiyev’s alleged bosses, asked him as he sat on the stand in Manhattan federal court.
Bungling hitman Khalid Mehdiyev at the door of an exiled Iranian-American journalist he was sent to kill in 2022. Twitter/@AlinejadMasih
“That’s correct,” he answered.
“Big responsibility, doing both at the same time!” Fast said of the wannabe-killer’s day job at Peppino’s.
“That’s right, miss,” the self-professed Russian mobster dryly replied.
But Mehdiyev, 27, didn’t offer much else during a lengthy cross-examination on the third day of the proceedings against Rafat Amirov and Polad Omarov, Azerbaijan nationals who allegedly hired Mehdiyev to kill journalist and Iranian regime critic Masih Alinejad back in 2022.
Agents of the Iranian government have been hunting Alinejad relentlessly since she fled the Middle Eastern country in 2009, but their barbarous schemes have so far fallen short.
Omarov and Amirov are now on trial for murder-for-hire and attempted murder in aid of racketeering for the plot — and authorities have said they and Mehdiyev were part of the same gang in their shared home country.
Masih Alinejad fled Iran after the country’s disputed 2009 elections and became an American citizen about 10 years later. REUTERS
But Mehdiyev was conspicuously reluctant to talk Thursday — even when Fast asked him if he worked for the ride-share company Uber in 2020.
Mehdiyev answered that he didn’t remember — to which Fast replied, “Amnesia as we sit here today?”
“No, miss,” Mehdiyev replied.
“You don’t remember this part of your life?” she asked.
“Just a long time I’ve been in jail, some things I don’t remember,” he answered.
“You don’t remember driving 922 miles for Uber in 2020? Is that your testimony today?”
“Yes, miss,” the convicted felon replied.
Rafat Amirov and Polad Omarev during their trial’s jury selection. The pair are charged with murder-for-hire and money laundering for trying to have an Iranian-American journalist killed. REUTERS
His close-mouthed testimony stood in stark contrast to Wednesday’s hearing, when he told the court he tried to ingratiate himself into Alinejad’s world by texting her about various topics — including one where he said, “U the best journalist.”
“I was trying to get into her life,” Mehdiyev, a bearded bear of a man originally from the Caspian Sea country of Azerbaijan, said coldly.
“I was trying to get the easy way to kill her.”
But he failed time and time again.
Eventually, he tried to stake out her Flatbush home — but botched the assignment on July 28, 2022, when he tipped his hand by trying to open her door, ordering food to his car as he lurked outside and then running a stop sign as the cops trailed him.
Police arrested him in his Subaru Forester SUV with Illinois plates just outside Alinejad’s house after the series of staggering slipups.
Iranian journalist and regime critic Masih Alinejad in her home in Flatbush, Brooklyn. William Miller
When they searched the car, they found a loaded AK-47 with one in the chamber and a ski mask — which Mehdiyev plainly said in court he planned to use to assassinate Alinejad.
“I was there to try to kill the journalist,” said Mehdiyev, of Yonkers.
Prosecutors have said Iran’s government offered to pay Amirov, 45, and Omarov, 40, about $500,000 for the hit on a woman known for her constant and unflinching criticism of the Iranian regime.
The criminal pair pleaded not guilty to the charges, which could imprison them for decades if they’re convicted.
Mehdiyev — who said he was paid $30,000 for the botched hit — decided to cooperate with the feds after pleading guilty to attempted murder and gun charges.
He faces at least 15 years in prison for trying to kill Alinejad and unrelated racketeering charges.
Early Wednesday morning, Alinejad posted on X about how grateful she was that law enforcement protected her from her would-be killer.
“I recorded this video just months after a man was arrested outside my Brooklyn home with a loaded gun,” she wrote, referencing a video she posted of her standing outside with a group of NYPD cops.
“Today, in a federal court, he admitted he was sent by the Islamic Republic to kill me for the ‘crime’ of speaking out,” she said.
“Profoundly grateful to U.S. law enforcement for not only protecting my life but also standing up for free speech,” she continued.
“Free speech should never be punishable by death.”
