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Iranian arms dealer and one of the Hashemi brothers involved in secret arms sales and hostage negotiations related to Iran-Contra. | 2026-10-14 |
Reza Hashemi was one of the Hashemi brothers, an Iran living in the United States. He was involved in secret arms sales and negotiations concerning the American hostages in Tehran.1
Hashemi was arrested after his brothers, Cyrus Hashemi and Jamshid Hashemi, were tipped off about their indictment under the Arms Export Control Act for illegal arms sales to Iran. He became a hostage himself, which pressured his elder brothers to negotiate with U.S. Customs to become informants.1
The report of the congressional Iran-Contra committees records that in May 1984 federal criminal charges were filed against Cyrus Hashemi and his brothers Reza and Jamshid, among others, for alleged arms export control violations; that Cyrus arranged with the U.S. Customs Service to run a sting operation resulting in the April 22, 1986 indictment of 17 individuals in the Southern District of New York on charges of an illegal scheme to smuggle $2.5 billion in American-made weapons to Iran; and that until Cyrus's death in July 1986 he was to be the primary prosecution witness.2 The Second Circuit wrote that the arms in that case were destined for Cyrus, "a government agent pretending to be an Iranian buyer," and that the original indictment was returned in May 1986.3 Judge Leonard B. Sand wrote in 1987 that none of the arms deals charged was consummated and that Cyrus's negotiations with the defendants were tape recorded.4
Footnotes
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Ben-Menashe, Ari. Profits of War: Inside the Secret U.S.-Israeli Arms Network. Sheridan Square Press, 1992 (TrineDay reprint, 2015). ↩︎
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Report of the Congressional Committees Investigating the Iran-Contra Affair, H. Rept. 100-433, S. Rept. 100-216 (Nov. 1987), ch. 9, note 13, p. 171. https://archive.org/details/reportofcongress87unit ↩︎
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United States v. Evans, 844 F.2d 36 (2d Cir. 1988). https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/504381/united-states-v-evans/ ↩︎
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United States v. Evans, 667 F. Supp. 974 (S.D.N.Y. 1987). https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/2158497/united-states-v-evans/ ↩︎