One of the alleged would-be assassins hired by Iran is a self-employed pipe fitter from Staten Island and convicted murderer.
Carlisle ‘Pop’ Rivera, 49, was arrested on Thursday and charged with conspiracy to murder Iranian activist Masih Alinejad.
Rivera’s wife Margarita Vega did not answer the door at their two-story home in Staten Island on Friday.
Neighbors told DailyMail.com Rivera moved out with his wife and their son three months ago. They were shocked to learn of his alleged involvement.
The father-of-two was allegedly hired by Farjad Shakeri, 51, and roped in his friend Jonathon Loadholt, 36, who was arrested and charged alongside him.
They were promised $100,000 to do surveillance on Alinejad and later kill her, and would have gone after Trump too if the plot wasn’t put on hold.
Carlisle ‘Pop’ Rivera, 49, one of the alleged would-be assassins hired by Iran is a self employed pipe fitter from Staten Island and convicted murderer
The Justice Department unsealed criminal charges on a thwarted plot by Iran to kill President-elect Donald Trump before the election
His brother Obed Rivera, also a felon jailed in 2002 for drug manufacture and distribution, living in South Carolina hung up when DailyMail.com called.
Shakeri, a Afghani who came to the US as a child before he was deported in 2008, was hired by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard to orchestrate the hit on Alinejad for $1.5 million, and two Jewish businessmen living in the US.
Then in September he was told to focus on assassinating Trump instead, but by then had flipped to the FBI and sold out Rivera on Thursday.
Rivera was convicted of second-degree murder in 1994 and met Shakeri when they were both at Fishkill Correctional Facility in Beacon, New York, in 2005 to 2007.
Shakeri told the FBI he met a senior member of the Revolutionary Guard through his work in Tehran in the ‘oil and fuel businesses.’
The man was referred to by others around him as Majid Soleimani, but Shakeri said he has no way of knowing whether the man is connected to late Iranian military officer Qassem Soleimani, who was assassinated under Trump’s watch in 2020.
Vega did not answer the door at their two-story home in Staten Island when DailyMail.com approached for comment
Rivera was convicted of second-degree murder in 1994 and met the man who allegedly hired him when they were both at Fishkill Correctional Facility in Beacon, New York, in 2005 to 2007
When Majid learned Shakeri used to live in New York, he offered him a large sum of money to investigate – and ultimately kill – Iranian-American activist and journalist Masih Alinejad.
According to the criminal complaint seen by DailyMail.com, Rivera was waiting on a $100,000 payment from the IRGC to carry out the assassination.
But Shakeri said by mid-late September, this IRGC official had told him to ‘put aside his other efforts on behalf of the IRGC and focus on surveilling, and ultimately assassinating, Donald Trump.
Shakeri told him would cost a ‘huge’ amount of money to pull it off, but was told ‘we have already spent a lot of money… so the money’s not an issue’.
Vega did not answer the door at their two-storey home in Staten Island on Friday
The FBI believed this to mean Iran already spent money trying to kill Trump, so what was a little more if it got the job done.
He was given a seven-day deadline from October 7 to devise a thorough plan to carry out the assassination attempt.
He was told if he could not come up with a plan in this timeframe, the attempt would be put on the back burner until after the election, because officials in Iran assumed Trump would lose the election and then have less protection.
Shakeri finally admitted on October 28 he had people in NYC helping with the jobs, but refused to identify them.
He appeared to be brokering a deal to cooperate in exchange for the release of an unnamed person.
‘If these people gimme a green light… I’m gonna come pretty close so you guys can be convinced that [Individual-I] needs to get released,’ he said.
Rivera, 49, was arrested on Thursday and charged with conspiracy to murder the president-elect and Iranian activist Masih Alinejad
FBI agents confronted Shakeri on Thursday, accusing him of lying to them, and he finally gave up Rivera, and though he said there was a second person, he did not name them.
Rivera and Loadholt allegedly became involved in February when Shakeri paid them $1,000 to surveil Alinejad at a speaking engagement at Fairfield University in Fairfield, Connecticut, on February 15.
Communications between the pair allegedly showed them discussing when they would be paid for the job.
The event was canceled at the last minute when the FBI warned Alinejad not to go, though it was unclear how they knew about a threat.
Shakeri’s next alleged job for them was to to keep watch on Alinejad at her home in Brooklyn in March, for which they were paid about $2,600 each.
Activist and journalist Masih Alinejad was the secondary target in Iran’s plot to assassinate Donald Trump, court documents revealed
Text messages allegedly showed Rivera and Loadholt coordinating their surveillance with plans to meet and where they were going.
The pair allegedly complained to Shakeri that Alinejad was hard to pin down and that assassinating her was not going to be an easy task.
‘This bitch is hard to catch, bro. And because she hard to catch, there ain’t gonna be no simple pull up, unless there the luck of the draw. Unless there’s the luck of the draw,’ Rivera allegedly said in a voice note.
Shakeri advised them that their target spent most of the time in a study on the third floor and a recording studio on the second floor.
‘You just gotta have patience and don’t, kicking, kick in the door is not an option because that’ s a fail, that’s a fail maneuver,’ he warned in a voice note reply.
‘You gotta wait and have patience to catch her either going in the house or coming out, or following her out somewhere and taking care of it. Don’t think about going in. In is a suicide move.’
Rivera allegedly complained in response: ‘We was here at night time, like 5.30 this morning, there was no f**kin’ lights on…. I already know kickin’ in doors only gonna to bring more attention. We already know that, that part.
‘That neighborhood is too quiet for that type of shit. Unless she’s on the first floor, and you kick that s**t in and then, then, you know, and let’s assume you kick it in on the first try.’
Trump has been a target of Iran assassination threats since he ordered the strike that killed Soleimani, the leader of the brutal Iranian Quds Forces
One of the weapons the hitmen allegedly bought for the assassination
Rivera appeared to get increasingly frustrated with the assignment and how much the expenses were adding up.
‘What I’m sayin’ to you in a nutshell, bro. Is in order for this to get done? And I don’t give a fuck who is… You say, ‘f**k you, n***a, I want somebody else.’
‘Ok, your secret safe with me ’cause I ain’t no snitch n**a, and I sure ain’t no bitch n***a. So I can handle that, right.
‘By the same token, you not gonna find too many motherf**kers who willing to take the job with receiving next to nothin’ to start the job off with.
‘You sent me thirty-one fifty, right? That pays for some tools and fuels, right? Tools and fuels that’s being, the slammer, mostly, the slammer.
‘Um, toll bridge fee, going back and forth. Putting gas in the car. Rentin’ the car. Look, the car ain’t mine bromie, that s**t is bein’ rented. It’s funded by the thirty-one fifty.
‘S**t ain’ t, know what I mean, n***as ain’t just lettin’ you hold their car to do a drive by for nothin’, know what I mean, so.
Shakeri allegedly paid Rivera and Loadholt $1,000 to surveil Alinejad at a speaking engagement at Fairfield University in Fairfield, Connecticut. This screenshot showed the details for the event, a photo of her, and a money order for $500 to be paid to Rivera
One of the photos allegedly taken by Rivera and Loadholt during the surveillance
‘But homie, how long you think that’s gonna last? How long can you expect two workin’ niggas, or one workin’ n***a, really me, but my man too, he a workin’ n***a too.
‘He not like, he’s gonna sit out here all night, all day, rain, cold, sleet, on a promise. Let’s be for real, we out here on a promise, from a n***a I know.’
Rivera appeared to make a veiled threat, pointing out it was good for both Loadholt and Shakeri that they knew as little about each other as possible, and that they were only connected through him.
The FBI alleged he used this to ask for more cash to finish the operation, as he had already bought weapons for the hit, paid for travel costs, and rented the car to kill the target in a drive-by shooting.
He allegedly claimed Loadholt only went along with the plan because he vouched for Shakeri, and would have refused if anyone else asked him.
The pair allegedly negotiated a $100,000 fee to ‘finish the job’ during April, and Shakeri had the cash laundered, with a delay that irked Rivera.
‘Finish the work, and pick up,’ Shakeri instructed his lackey, to which Rivera allegedly answered, ‘N**a I wish it was that easy but I ain’t no quitter’.
Pictures released by the Justice Department after the thwarted attempt on Trump’s life
Trump assassination attempt pictures released by the government
Shakeri later told them to ‘take care of it already’.
‘I wish you can take care of it already. I have everything covered. By the way send me a bill and don’t spend it, n***a,’ he wrote on July 16.
Loadholt and Rivera in texts to each other allegedly complained about the delay in receiving the $100,000 payment.
‘I’m so frustrated son I’m like ready to jump out the window,’ Loadholt wrote in one messages.
Their fortunes began to unravel when Shakeri had voluntary interviews with the FBI on the phone from Iran on September 30, October 8, October 17, October 28, and November 7.