Carlisle Rivera, a man who prosecutors say was hired by Iranian operative Farhad Shakeri as part of a murder-for-hire plot to assassinate Iranian dissident Masih Alinejad, was sentenced to 15 years in prison on Wednesday.
Alinejad has survived three plots by Iran’s regime to kill or kidnap her. She confronted Rivera at his sentencing in federal court in Manhattan.
“Now I’m going to face the killer, my would-be assassin,” Alinejad, an activist and critic of Iran’s repression of women, said before sentencing. “But the main killer in my eyes is the IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps).”
Prosecutors said Shakeri was “tasked by the regime to direct a network of criminal associates to further Iran’s assassination plots against its targets.” They alleged that he directed two men in New York, Rivera and Jonathan Loadholt, to murder Alinejad in exchange for $100,000. Shakeri told federal authorities that the IRGC also had tasked him with arranging to kill 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,” said Alinejad. “I’ve been 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.”
Masih Alinejad blows a kiss to supporters outside a federal courthouse after testifying at the trial of her accused would-be assassins in New York on March 18, 2025.
Seth Wenig / AP
Prosecutors emphasized the seriousness of the plot orchestrated by the IRGC, which they said is “responsible for a spree of plots here and around the world.” They said it was intended “to kill the voices of those inside Iran who depend on people like Masih Alinejad to give voice to their hopes.”
The assassination attempt on Alinejad was set to take place in February 2024 at Fairfield University in Connecticut, where she had a speaking event. 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.
This was the second time that Alinejad had faced a man charged with plotting to assassinate her in the past year. Two men, who prosecutors said were members of a Russian mob hired by Iran, received 25-year prison terms in October for attempting to kill Alinejad at her Brooklyn home.
Alinejad broke down in tears as she entered the courtroom on Wednesday. During an emotional sentencing, she said the Iranian government seeks to silence her.Â
“I had to face him because I live with fear,” Alinejad said, looking directly at Rivera. But she told the judge what she wants is 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 freedom of speech here in America.”Â
Alinejad’s husband, Kambiz Foroohar, implored Judge Lewis Liman to hand down the maximum sentence to send a message “that anyone who joins the Islamic Republic to do their dirty work will be held accountable.”
Foroohar told the court that his family has been deprived of normalcy as they face “dangers from a hostile foreign government.”Â
“On one occasion, Rivera missed my wife by just one hour,” said Foroohar. “The threats have forced us to abandon our home, our neighborhood, our friends. Fear is a constant in our life.”
Alinejad sat with her head in her hands as the prosecution talked about voice notes exchanged between Rivera and Shakeri. They plotted how to commit her murder, including considering a home-invasion-style break-in of Alinejad’s home, or a drive-by shooting.Â
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 a murder conviction at the age of 18.
The judge described conversations between Shakeri and Rivera as “chilling.”Â
Rivera, dressed in a tan prison uniform, wept as he apologized “to my fellow Americans, and to the lady and man that just spoke,” referring to Alinejad and Foroohar.
Rivera’s fiancée sat a couple of rows behind him, crying. During a break in the sentencing, Alinejad approached Rivera’s fiancée and embraced her in a hug. His fiancée apologized over and over again.
After Rivera was sentenced, Alinejad told CBS News, “Justice is always beautiful. It is justice for me.”Â
“But, in the bigger picture, no,” she said it is not enough to only put her would-be killers behind bars.
She alleges Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ordered her killing, pointing to a speech in which he refers to an “American agent” who had compared the compulsory hijab to the Berlin Wall. Alinejad has previously made that exact comparison.
“This is kind of the [Iranian] regime challenging U.S. national security, on U.S. soil, sending a signal that we can do whatever we want,” she said, adding that real justice would be seeing “the man who ordered my killing … behind bars,” referring to Khamenei. She wants to see him “humiliated the same way as” former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, who was captured by U.S. forces in 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 targeting both her and Mr. Trump, Alinejad said it is 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 woman, with a lot of hair, with a big voice. That’s it,” she added. “And that shows you that the regime in Iran is really scared of its own people.
When she first learned the same man had plotted to kill her and Mr. Trump, Alinejad laughed and told her husband: “Wow, they think I am as powerful as President Trump … Just my voice. My weapon is my voice.” At the same time, she recalled feeling fear, remembering how for years the Iranian regime said America is the “great Satan” and “the biggest enemy of Iran.”Â
“The same group who targeted President Trump, they wanted to target me,” said Alinejad. “It means that now in their eyes, I am the great Satan. I am their biggest enemy.”
Loadholt’s sentencing is scheduled for April 23. Shakeri is believed to be in Iran.
— Masih Alinejad is a CBS News contributor
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