British isles courtroom: Arrested person is US fugitive wanted on rape claim
LONDON — A decide in Scotland dominated Friday that a gentleman who has put in virtually a calendar year preventing extradition to the United States is Nicholas Rossi, a fugitive alleged to have faked his individual dying to escape rape allegations.
The suspect was arrested in December 2021 at a Glasgow hospital the place he was remaining taken care of for COVID-19. He denies getting Rossi and says he is an Irish orphan named Arthur Knight who has in no way been to the U.S.
Immediately after observing proof together with fingerprints and tattoos, judge Norman McFadyen informed Edinburgh Sheriff Courtroom that “I am in the long run happy on the stability of probabilities … that Mr. Knight is certainly Nicholas Rossi, the person sought for extradition by the United States.”
The suspect has accused authorities of possessing him tattooed even though he was in a coma to resemble the wanted guy and of surreptitiously using his fingerprints to body him.
McFadyen said those people promises of mistaken id had been “implausible” and “fanciful.”
U.S. authorities say Rossi is an alias employed by Nicholas Alahverdian, 35, who has been billed in connection with a 2008 rape in Utah.
Authorities in Rhode Island have stated Alahverdian is also required in their point out for failing to sign-up as a sex offender. The FBI has explained he also faces fraud expenses in Ohio, where by he was convicted of sexual intercourse-connected prices in 2008.
In the latest decades, Alahverdian experienced been an outspoken critic of Rhode Island’s Department of Little ones, Youth and Households, testifying prior to condition lawmakers about staying sexually abused and tortured when in foster treatment.
Then in 2020, he told neighborhood media he had late-stage non-Hodgkin lymphoma and experienced weeks to live.
An obituary released on the internet claimed he died on Feb. 29, 2020. But by last year, Rhode Island state law enforcement, Alahverdian’s former lawyer and former foster household have been publicly doubting whether or not he truly died.
Considering the fact that his arrest in Scotland, the suspect has designed several courtroom appearances and fired at least 6 attorneys — all while insisting he just isn’t Nicholas Rossi.
Now that is identity has been recognized a comprehensive extradition hearing is scheduled to get started in March. The choose refused a request for bail, indicating Rossi was a flight risk.
LONDON — A decide in Scotland dominated Friday that a gentleman who has put in virtually a calendar year preventing extradition to the United States is Nicholas Rossi, a fugitive alleged to have faked his individual dying to escape rape allegations.
The suspect was arrested in December 2021 at a Glasgow hospital the place he was remaining taken care of for COVID-19. He denies getting Rossi and says he is an Irish orphan named Arthur Knight who has in no way been to the U.S.
Immediately after observing proof together with fingerprints and tattoos, judge Norman McFadyen informed Edinburgh Sheriff Courtroom that “I am in the long run happy on the stability of probabilities … that Mr. Knight is certainly Nicholas Rossi, the person sought for extradition by the United States.”
The suspect has accused authorities of possessing him tattooed even though he was in a coma to resemble the wanted guy and of surreptitiously using his fingerprints to body him.
McFadyen said those people promises of mistaken id had been “implausible” and “fanciful.”
U.S. authorities say Rossi is an alias employed by Nicholas Alahverdian, 35, who has been billed in connection with a 2008 rape in Utah.
Authorities in Rhode Island have stated Alahverdian is also required in their point out for failing to sign-up as a sex offender. The FBI has explained he also faces fraud expenses in Ohio, where by he was convicted of sexual intercourse-connected prices in 2008.
In the latest decades, Alahverdian experienced been an outspoken critic of Rhode Island’s Department of Little ones, Youth and Households, testifying prior to condition lawmakers about staying sexually abused and tortured when in foster treatment.
Then in 2020, he told neighborhood media he had late-stage non-Hodgkin lymphoma and experienced weeks to live.
An obituary released on the internet claimed he died on Feb. 29, 2020. But by last year, Rhode Island state law enforcement, Alahverdian’s former lawyer and former foster household have been publicly doubting whether or not he truly died.
Considering the fact that his arrest in Scotland, the suspect has designed several courtroom appearances and fired at least 6 attorneys — all while insisting he just isn’t Nicholas Rossi.
Now that is identity has been recognized a comprehensive extradition hearing is scheduled to get started in March. The choose refused a request for bail, indicating Rossi was a flight risk.