The ex-boyfriend of a Canadian woman who was abducted by fake police officers has been charged with first-degree murder, marking the latest twist in a high-profile kidnapping case that had appeared to stump investigators for nearly two years.
Elnaz Hajtamiri was dragged from a property in an Ontario beach community on 12 January 2022 by three men with police equipment who forced their way into the home and hauled her barefoot through the snow to a waiting vehicle.
On Thursday, police said Mohamad Lilo, Hajtamiri’s ex-boyfriend, had been charged with her murder, in the first public indication from police that they believe the missing woman is dead.
Lilo, who was also Hajtamiri’s former business partner, was already facing kidnapping charges over her disappearance – and separate charges of attempted murder and attempted kidnapping in connection with a previous assault in which she was attacked in an underground garage and beaten with a frying pan.
The attack caused serious head wounds that required 40 stitches. Police said they later retrieved a tracking device from the scene. Two other tracking devices were found in her car when she brought the vehicle in for a service in November.
Police charged two men, Riyasat Singh and Harshdeep Binner, in relation to the parking garage attack.
In the months after the abduction, investigators called for the public to come forward with any information.
“Nothing weighs more heavily on our souls than the idea that we may never know what happened to Elnaz. We know there are people out there who have information and who may be contemplating coming forward,” Fariba Hajtamiri, her mother, wrote in a statement earlier in the year.
“We pray that you will do the right thing and help us out of this suffering.”
The family had also offered a C$100,000 reward for information that could lead to the arrest of her abductors.
Hajtamiri, who also went by the surname Tamiri, was born in Iran and emigrated to Canada less than five years ago, after she lost her husband. Not long before her disappearance she had started her own cake-making company after leaving an import-export business.
