Carlisle Rivera, a man who prosecutors say was hired by Iranian agent Farhad Shakeri in a murder-for-hire plot to assassinate an Iranian dissident Masih Alinejadwas sentenced Wednesday to 15 years in prison.
Alinejad survived three plots of the Iranian regime to kill or kidnap her. She confronted Rivera during his sentencing in federal court in Manhattan.
“Now I will face the killer, my would-be assassin,” Alinejad, an activist and critic of Iran’s repression of women, said before the sentencing. “But the main killer in my eyes is the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).”
Prosecutors said Shakeri was “charged by the regime with leading a network of criminal associates to further Iran’s assassination plots against its targets.” They alleged that he ordered two men in New York, Rivera and Jonathan Loadholt, to assassinate Alinejad in exchange for $100,000. Shakeri told federal authorities that the IRGC also tasked him with organizing the assassination of President Donald Trump before the 2024 election.
“The IRGC, the Revolutionary Guards, is behind the assassination plots. The same IRGC that is ordering a massacre right now in Iran,” Alinejad said. “I was bombarded by Iranians receiving videos showing the IRGC using AK-47 military weapons to kill people. The same IRGC gave money to the assassins here to buy AK-47s to end my life. »
Seth Wenig/AP 
Prosecutors stressed the seriousness of the plot orchestrated by the IRGC, which they say is “responsible for a series of plots here and around the world.” They said the aim was to “kill the voices of those in Iran who depend on people like Masih Alinejad to express their hopes.”
Alinejad’s assassination attempt was scheduled to take place in February 2024 at Fairfield University in Connecticut, where she gave a lecture. After months of surveillance, the plot was foiled. Rivera and Loadholt were arrested in November 2024 and pleaded guilty before the case could go to trial.
It was the second time Alinejad has faced a man accused of plotting to assassinate him in the past year. Two men, who prosecutors say were members of a Russian mafia hired by Iran, were sentenced to 25 years in prison in October for attempt to kill Alinejad at her Brooklyn home.
Alinejad broke down in tears as she entered the courtroom Wednesday. In an emotional sentencing, she said the Iranian government was seeking to silence her.
“I had to confront him because I live in fear,” Alinejad said, looking directly at Rivera. But she told the judge she wanted to testify against the men who hired the killer, the Revolutionary Guards. “My job is to expose the massacre and the brutality of the regime,” she said, but “they are targeting free speech here in America.”
Alinejad’s husband, Kambiz Foroohar, implored Judge Lewis Liman to hand down the maximum sentence to send the message “that anyone who joins the Islamic Republic to do its dirty work will be held accountable.”
Foroohar told the court his family had been deprived of normality as they faced the “dangers of a hostile foreign government”.
“On one occasion, Rivera missed my wife by just an hour,” Foroohar said. “The threats forced us to abandon our home, our neighborhood, our friends. Fear is a constant in our lives.”
Alinejad sat with her head in her hands as the prosecution spoke about the voice notes exchanged between Rivera and Shakeri. They plotted how to carry out his murder, including considering a home invasion-style break-in at Alinejad’s house or a drive-by shooting.
Rivera and Shakeri had met in the New York prison system, prosecutors said. Shakeri was serving a sentence for manslaughter. Rivera spent 18 years in prison after being convicted of murder when he was 18 years old.
The judge called the conversations between Shakeri and Rivera “chilling.”
Rivera, dressed in a beige prison uniform, cried as he apologized “to my fellow Americans, and to the lady and man who just spoke,” referring to Alinejad and Foroohar.
Rivera’s fiancée was sitting a few rows behind him and crying. During a break in the sentencing, Alinejad approached Rivera’s fiancee and hugged her. His fiancée apologized repeatedly.
After Rivera’s conviction, Alinejad told CBS News, “Justice is always beautiful. This is justice for me.”
“But, overall, no,” she said, it’s not enough to put her would-be killers behind bars.
She claims that Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, ordered her assassination, pointing to a speech in which he referred to an “American agent” who compared the compulsory hijab to the Berlin Wall. Alinejad has already made this exact comparison.
“It’s a bit like [Iranian] “The regime is challenging the national security of the United States, on American soil, sending a signal that we can do whatever we want,” she said, adding that true justice would be to see “the man who ordered my assassination… behind bars,” referring to Khamenei. She wants to see him “humiliated in the same way as” former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, who was captured by U.S. forces during a military operation in Venezuela earlier this month and brought back to New York to face federal charges. “
Reflecting on Shakeri’s alleged role in his attacks on her and Mr. Trump, Alinejad said it was a “badge of honor” that “they want to get rid of me as much as they want to get rid of President Trump.”
“President Trump has an army, everything, power. I’m just an Iranian, unarmed, with a lot of hair, with a big voice. That’s it,” she added. “And this shows that the Iranian regime is truly afraid of its own people.
When she learned that the same man had plotted to kill her and Mr. Trump, Alinejad laughed and told her husband: “Wow, they think I’m as powerful as President Trump… Just my voice. My weapon is my voice.” At the same time, she recalled feeling fear, recalling how, for years, the Iranian regime had declared that America was the “great Satan” and “Iran’s greatest enemy.”
“The same group that targeted President Trump wanted to target me,” Alinejad said. “This means that from now on, in their eyes, I am the great Satan. I am their greatest enemy.”
Loadholt’s sentencing is scheduled for April 23. Shakeri is believed to be in Iran.
— Masih Alinejad is a CBS News contributor
