What Role Did Drugs Play in Killing Tech Exec?

Sline Technology CEO Bob Lee visited the suspected drug dealer’s home with the alleged killer’s sister just hours before he died in a riot, The Standard has learned from a source familiar with the matter.

What happened in the apartment could play a key role in the April 4 kitchen knife murder case against 38-year-old Nima Momeni.

Prosecutor Momeni said his sister, Kazar Momeni, asked Lee about whether she was doing drugs or doing “something inappropriate” after she left the apartment near Van Ness Street on April 3.

The apartment is occupied by a man convicted of a felony last year for possession of a controlled substance with intent to sell. Police have previously made arrests for possession of various substances including meth, cocaine, ecstasy, acid and magic mushrooms.

Those new details obtained by The Standard indicate that people involved in the case were behind the doors of San Franciscans’ wealthy party drug high-rises.

“We are actively investigating the background of the behavior of all parties in the three or four days before the incident,” Paula Khani, Nima Momeni’s defense lawyer, told The Standard. “A common theme I’m seeing is serious illegal drug use.”

Lee, the 43-year-old founder of CashUp and chief operating officer of MobileCoin, was killed while visiting San Francisco from his new home in Miami. He still went by the nickname “Crazy Bob” in his fraternity days and was known to use drugs recreationally, a friend said.

Kazar Momeni, known to many as “Tina,” may have used drugs because it bothered her brother and caused conflict with her friends, said Samira Kuduzovic, who was friends with the siblings, and two others close to her. Kazar Momeni, who wished to remain anonymous.

Nima Momeni, an information technology consultant who lives in Emeryville, was arrested at her East Bay home more than a week after the murder. He has not yet entered a plea and is scheduled to appear in court on Tuesday.

In the hours before the stabbing, Lee, Kazar Momeni, the suspected drug dealer and an unidentified friend were at the apartment in the 1500 block of Mission Street, a source familiar with the case and court records said.

The Standard is not naming the man who lived in the apartment at this time because it is unclear what his role in the case is.

In the year In 2022, he was found guilty of possession of a controlled substance with intent to sell. In two different cases.

In two raids on his former residence, police found various drugs, including GBL (a compound similar to a date-rape drug), nitrous oxide, MDMA and LSD. Prosecutors described him as “deeply involved in the trafficking of controlled substances.”

After leaving the apartment, prosecutors said Lee went to a hotel on the Embarcadero and Kazar Momeni to her home in the Millennium Tower. After some time, Nima Momeni became upset with Lee and questioned him about his “inappropriate behavior” and drug use.

Lee assured Nima Momeni that nothing inappropriate had happened, prosecutors said.

Lee and Nima Momeni ended up at the Millennium Tower that night, prosecutors said. Court documents show police captured surveillance footage of them leaving together and driving to an area under the Bay Bridge, where investigators say Lee was stabbed.

Khazar Momeni apparently sent a message to Lee about the April 3 clash.

“I just wanted to make sure you’re doing okay because I know Nima came hard on you,” Lee wrote in a text message, prosecutors said. “And thank you for being such a classy person to handle with class. I love you, Selfish.”

When they met, the alleged businessman admitted to being “close” friends with Lee.

“I loved Bob,” he said.

He said he did not go to the hotel with Lee.

Nima and Khazar Momeni were close siblings, often spending time together, friends and exes said. He lived in Emeryville, while she was in San Francisco.

Although no stranger to the party scene himself, Nima Momeni tried to protect his younger sister from potential problems with drug use, according to Kuduzovic, a woman who was friends with the siblings.

“He always played the big brother, he always looked after her,” Kuduzovic said.

Kuduzovic told Nima Momeni not to give drugs to his sister.

Kuduzovic eventually wrote a letter to her friend’s husband, famous plastic surgeon Dr. Dino Eliasnia Khazar Momeni, to stop calling him.

“She was basically asking me to buy medicine with my money,” she said.

Still, Kuduzovic never expected the situation to end with the alleged murder. Nima described Mome as a “sweet person” and a “gentleman”.

Taraneh Aipakchi, who was close friends with Lee and knew Kazar Momeni, said she believes the two met around 2020.

She said their relationship seemed romantic. When Aipakchi Kazar Momeni warned Lin that she was married, she recalled that she told her, “She doesn’t mind because she’s flirting with me.”

Aipakchi also said that Lee “loved to party.”

“Incidentally, he liked to do a lot of medicine,” Aipakchi said. But he was the sweetest person ever. He always had this light around him.