Jurors reach verdict for Nima Momeni in murder of Cash App founder Bob Lee
Dec 17, 2024
Jurors in the murder trial of Nima Momeni, a tech consultant accused of violently stabbing Cash App founder Bob Lee, have reached a verdict in the case.
The decision will be announced on Tuesday.
Lee was killed in San Francisco in the early hours of April 4, 2023. He was spotted around 2:30 a.m. stumbling through the streets and begging for help before he died during emergency surgery at Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital.
Prior to the killing, Lee apparently had an argument with Momeni about his younger sister, Khazar Momeni, after they attended a house party together. Prosecutors have said Momeni became furious with Lee for introducing Khazar to a drug dealer who gave her GHB, known as a date-rape drug, and then sexually assaulted her.
nyFacebookBob Lee, the founder of Cash App and the former chief technology officer of Square.
The 43-year-old Cash App founder tried to calm Momeni, telling him neither he nor his sister had done anything illegal — though a toxicology report later revealed he had ketamine and cocaine in his system at the time of his death.
Surveillance video from later in the night shows Lee and Momeni separately arrive at the swanky condo Khazar shares with her husband, prominent San Francisco plastic surgeon Dino Elyassnia. Footage also captured the men leaving together in Momeni’s BMW.
From there, prosecutors said that Nima drove Lee to a “dark and secluded” street corner and stabbed him in a “planned and deliberate attack.”
“That protectiveness of the defendant’s little sister is what led to all of this,” said Dane Reinstedt, assistant district attorney.
Nima Momeni, the man charged in the fatal stabbing of Cash App founder Bob Lee, makes his way into the courtroom at the Hall of Justice for his arraignment in San Francisco, Tuesday, May 2, 2023. (Gabrielle Lurie/San Francisco Chronicle via AP, Pool)
Momeni’s defense team, on the other hand, has contended their client was acting in self-defense at the time and did not even realize he had stabbed Lee. He was forced to use his Krav Maga skills, they said, after making a “bad joke” that upset Lee, who was allegedly erratic and aggressive, having slept only six hours over a four-day period of doing cocaine and ketamine and drinking.
“He just went from zero to 100,” Momeni said from the stand. “You could see the anger.”
Momeni also testified that he and Lee were on good terms when his sister asked that they leave her condo. He said things took a turn when he hit a pothole, causing Lee to spill his beer. He previously pleaded not guilty to a first-degree murder charge including a knife enhancement, which carries a sentence of 26 years to life in prison.
With News Wire Services