The alleged mastermind of the headline-grabbing kidnapping and brutal torture of a Newport Beach pot grower, as well as the now ex-wife who helped set up his arrest, will be the focus of a two-hour broadcast by ABC News’ “20/20” airing Friday, March 13.
The show, which is expected to include an interview with The Orange County Register reporter who covered his trial, was scheduled to air at 9 p.m. Pacific Standard Time.
Nayeri was convicted last year of kidnapping and torture for the 2012 abduction of the Newport Beach dispensary owner, which prosecutors allege was carried out with the aid of two high school friends in order to find a non-existent $1 million they apparently believed the dispensary owner had buried in the desert.
Nayeri, in trial testimony that was often combative and at-times tearful, admitted to spending months conducting surveillance of the dispensary owner prior to the abduction but denied playing a role in the actual kidnapping.
The dispensary owner was abruptly woken up in the early hours of Oct. 2, 2012 by three masked men, at least one armed, who had broken into the Newport Beach home he was living in. The men bound and blindfolded the dispensary owner – as well as the girlfriend of the man who owned the home – and forced them into a van.
The men tortured the dispensary owner with rubber piping, a Taser and a blow torch during a two-hour-plus drive to the Mojave desert, demanding he give them the $1 million and ignoring his pleas that he didn’t have the money.
After arriving in the desert, the kidnappers cut the dispensary owner’s penis off, leaving him and the woman behind, still bound, as they drove off. The woman managed to free herself and flag down a sheriff’s deputy. The dispensary owner survived, though his missing body part was never recovered.
Police eventually identified Nayeri and two of his former classmates at Clovis West High School in Fresno – Kyle Handley and Ryan Kevorkian – as the men suspected of carrying out the kidnapping and torture. They also allege that Naomi Rhodus – Kevorkian’s estranged wife – purchased the weapons used in the kidnapping and helped rent the van.
Nayeri fled to Iran after the kidnapping. Shegerian eventually agreed to work with police and persuaded Nayeri to leave Iran and visit her in another country where he could be arrested.
Nayeri awaits sentencing.
While awaiting trial, he gained further notoriety for teaming up with two other inmates to carry out a daring escape from Orange County jail, before being recaptured a little more than a week later.
Handley, the first to go to trial, was convicted and sentenced to four life terms in prison. Kevorkian and Rhodus face upcoming trials.