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When Cash App founder Bob Lee was stabbed to demise on a San Francisco avenue almost two years in the past, it was initially assumed to be a theft gone fallacious and reignited an already rising fury over elevated violence within the metropolis.
But the assailant needed nothing to do with Lee’s cash, abandoning the tech titan’s watch and pockets after stabbing him to demise. Instead, because the district lawyer’s workplace alleged, it was a homicide of 1 tech skilled by one other, motivated by ardour.
San Francisco Police Sergeant Brent Dittmer, who was the lead detective on the case, says he knew this early on.
“There was a lot of talk that this was random homeless violence in San Francisco – could that have happened? Maybe. But it very quickly appeared that was not the case,” Dittmer tells NBC Dateline’s Josh Mankiewicz, in a clip shared with The Independent. The detective identified that Lee had nonetheless had his watch and pockets when he was discovered, within the episode “Under the Bay Bridge” airing Friday night.
Theories circulated on-line a few attainable mugging, however though Dittmer and his workforce believed it was one thing extra, they selected to to not publicly dispute the theories.
“If that’s the story people are gonna run with, that is an advantage for us because the people who are responsible, we don’t want to know what we know.” he mentioned “Let everybody think that this is whatever’s on Twitter at that time. We’ll work on what actually happened.”
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San Francisco Police Sergeant Brent Dittmer, the lead detective on the case (Dateline NBC)
The two-hour episode on Friday options unique interviews with Lee’s household and mates, in addition to colleagues from the tech trade, dramatic surveillance video footage an in-depth take a look at the timeline main as much as his demise, and the investigation that led to an arrest and conviction.
Lee’s former spouse, Krista, additionally speaks to Dateline, revealing the emotional aftermath his household has endured as she insists he would have by no means have put himself in such a harmful state of affairs – which made his homicide much more puzzling.
“The main people were saying that ‘he must have gotten mugged,’” she mentioned about Lee who was allegedly strolling again to his lodge late that evening when the assault occurred.
Krista mentioned she by no means believed the theft idea as a result of Lee by no means walked anyplace.
“He would’ve Ubered. Especially at that time,” she mentioned. “And had Bob been approached by someone that was trying to mug him, he would’ve given him, them, the shirt off his back, his wallet, his keys, his clothes. He would’ve said, ‘Hey, man, let me buy you a meal. Please don’t hurt me.’”
The 43-year-old beloved tech mogul was discovered staggering on a abandoned downtown avenue, dripping a path of blood and calling for assist after being stabbed within the early hours of April 4, 2023. He was rushed to a hospital however died of his accidents.
Lee’s violent demise despatched shock waves by means of the tech world and drew nationwide consideration. A widely known determine within the tech neighborhood, but there was no clear motive why somebody would wish to hurt him.
At one level, his demise infected debate over public security in San Francisco as X proprietor Elon Musk took to the social media web site to put up that “violent crime in SF is horrific and even if attackers are caught, they are often released immediately.”
But later that month, when Nima Momeni, 40, a Bay Area IT guide, was arrested and charged in Lee’s homicide, the motive of the killing started to shift.
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Krista Lee, who had two kids with Bob Lee and was married to him till 2019 (Dateline NBC)
Prosecutors argued that Momeni supposed to fatally stab Lee over an argument about his sister, whom Lee knew, and her reported drug use. Momeni mentioned that Lee attacked him with a knife and that he defended himself and Lee was stabbed.
In December 2024, after seven days of deliberations, the jury discovered Momeni responsible of second-degree homicide for killing Lee.
San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins mentioned the decision confirmed that the killing was a focused crime and never an instance of random lawlessness within the metropolis.
The evening of Bob’s homicide
Lee, who had created cell cost service Cash App and was the chief product officer of the cryptocurrency MobileCoin, had just lately moved to Miami to be nearer to his ex-wife and their two kids, and had returned to the Bay Area for a go to.
The afternoon earlier than the stabbing, Lee and Momeni’s sister Khazar Momeni had been doing medication and ingesting on the house of a drug supplier Lee knew, the Associated Press reported. Lee left earlier than Nima Momeni went to choose up his sister, who informed him she had been assaulted.
Prosecutors mentioned Momeni was livid with Lee for introducing Khazar to the drug supplier who gave her GHB, referred to as a date-rape drug, hours earlier than the stabbing.
A good friend of Lee’s testified that Momeni then grilled Lee over the telephone about what occurred to his sister whereas on the drug supplier’s house. He despatched textual content messages saying that the 2 males had been creeps and sexual predators.
Momeni later frolicked with Lee at his sister’s apartment till she kicked them out, saying she wanted to sleep.
Surveillance video exhibits the 2 males leaving Khazar Momeni’s posh apartment round 2 a.m. and stepping into Nima Momeni’s BMW. Other surveillance footage then exhibits them getting out of the automobile close to the Bay Bridge, the place the stabbing came about.
“That protectiveness of the defendant’s little sister is what led to all of this,” prosecutors mentioned.
The trial
The trial for Momeni started on October 14, 2024, in San Francisco, greater than a 12 months after the homicide.
In his first public statements concerning the occasions resulting in Lee’s demise, Momeni testified in his personal protection, telling the court docket that he had joked to Lee that he would possibly wish to spend his ultimate evening in San Francisco with household reasonably than looking for a strip membership.
Momeni testified that he stopped his automobile after going over a pothole that induced Lee to spill the beer he was holding. Momeni mentioned he then cracked a joke suggesting Lee ought to spend the final evening of his go to with household as a substitute of looking for a strip membership to maintain the occasion going.
That’s when he says Lee snapped, yelled at him about questioning his parenting expertise and pulled out the knife from his jacket pocket, and attacked.
“I was scared for my life,” Momeni mentioned throughout trial, in testimony that was rambling and contentious.
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Momeni throughout his trial in 2024 (Gabrielle Lurie/San Francisco Chronicle/AP)
He mentioned Lee walked away from the encounter, and confirmed no proof of being harm. He didn’t understand Lee had died till the next day, he mentioned.
“He’s a big famous guy,” he mentioned on the stand. “I’m just an average joe, an immigrant.”
Momeni mentioned he referred to as an lawyer when he realized of Lee’s demise the next day.
“I feel awful to his family, to himself,” Momeni mentioned on the stand. “He didn’t deserve it. I don’t think anyone deserved that.”
The prosecution mocked Momeni’s story, stating that he by no means referred to as police to report Lee’s alleged assault and even after he realized Lee had died of stab wounds on the road the place he had final seen him.
They additionally mentioned the puncture wounds had been clear, clear and deep, and never the results of any form of self-defense tussle, he mentioned. Just about all the DNA — 99 p.c — discovered on the deal with of the knife belonged to Momeni, the prosecutor mentioned.
Prosecutors additionally confirmed textual content messages Khazar Momeni despatched her brother, asking the place he had dropped off Lee — a query he sidestepped. She despatched a textual content message to Lee checking on him as a result of her brother got here “down hard” on him and to thank him for “handling it with class.”
The jury discovered the tech guide responsible of second-degree homicide, rejecting the defendant’s declare that he had acted in self protection.
Momeni faces 16 years to life in jail. He has not but been sentenced.
“We think justice was done here today,” the sufferer’s brother, Tim Oliver Lee, informed reporters following the decision. “What matters today is that we had a guilty verdict and Nima Momeni is going away for a very long time.”
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