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Russian mobsters face sentencing in US over attempt to kills Iranian journalist

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NEW YORK (AP) — A plot to assassinate Iranian-American journalist Masih Alinejad at her Brooklyn home came “chillingly near success,” prosecutors told a judge who will sentence two purported Russian mobsters.

Prosecutors are seeking 55-year prison terms for Rafat Amirov, 46, and Polad Omarov, 41, at their sentencing on Wednesday in Manhattan federal court. Prosecutors said Amirov, of Iran, and Omarov, of Georgia, were crime bosses in the Russian mob.

Lawyers for Amirov say he should not spend more than 13 years behind bars. Omarov’s attorneys called for a 10-year prison sentence.

The men were convicted in a two-week March trial that featured dramatic testimony from a hired gunman and Alinejad, an author, activist and contributor to Voice of America.

Alinejad said in a message to supporters Tuesday that she planned to be in court to face the men prosecutors say were high-ranking members of the Gulici, a faction of the Russian Mob that carried out murders, assaults, extortions, kidnappings, robberies, and arsons in the United States and abroad.

“They’ll receive their sentence, and I’ll speak my truth in my impact statement,” she said.

Alinejad, 49, led online campaigns encouraging women in........

© The Times of Israel