Tech Consultant Nima Momeni Arrested in Killing of Bob Lee in San Francisco

SAN FRANCISCO — 9 days after the deadly late-night stabbing of Bob Lee set off a livid outcry over public security in San Francisco, regulation enforcement officers mentioned on Thursday that they’d arrested an acquaintance of the distinguished tech government and would cost him with homicide.

The police recognized the person accused within the killing as Nima Momeni, 38, a tech entrepreneur and marketing consultant whom relations mentioned Mr. Lee had identified personally.

The proprietor of an enterprise tech enterprise within the East Bay metropolis of Emeryville, Mr. Momeni was taken into custody there after an intense investigation that performed out in opposition to heated claims that the killing mirrored a metropolis the place the skilled class was susceptible to random assaults. Mr. Momeni was booked on Thursday morning into the San Francisco County Jail and is scheduled to be arraigned on a homicide cost on Friday.

At a information convention, regulation enforcement officers acknowledged rising issues about random violence and property crimes within the metropolis however insisted that Mr. Lee’s killing didn’t match that sample.

“This has nothing to do with San Francisco — it has to do with human nature,” Invoice Scott, town’s police chief, mentioned.

Scott Wiener, a Democratic state senator who represents town, mentioned the push to judgment by tech luminaries resembling Elon Musk and colleagues of Mr. Lee, a widely known determine within the Silicon Valley, was each inaccurate and damaging to San Francisco, which has been straining to rebound from the coronavirus pandemic.

“That is the hazard of creating one crime into a logo,” Mr. Wiener mentioned. “This was a horrific, brutal homicide, and I’m so grateful that the police solved it so shortly. And San Francisco does have actual public security issues. However this specific crime doesn’t seem to have something to do with them.”

Mr. Lee’s brother, Oliver Lee, of Palo Alto, Calif., mentioned in an interview on Thursday that the strikes to “co-opt” the tragedy had been agonizing for his household. “Bob cherished being in San Francisco, and San Francisco cherished Bob,” he mentioned, including that younger individuals would cease his brother on the road there and ask for recommendation.

He mentioned that his brother, a father of two who had lately relocated to Miami after spending most of his profession within the Bay Space and Silicon Valley, had left town for work causes and had returned there usually, each for enterprise and to spend time along with his teenage daughters, who continued to reside within the Bay Space along with his former spouse.

Brooke Jenkins, the San Francisco district lawyer, mentioned that “the lack of a younger, vibrant chief and innovator has rocked our metropolis and even past.” However she criticized what she mentioned had been “reckless and irresponsible statements” portraying town as a hotbed of violent crime, pointing to feedback by Mr. Musk, the chief government of Twitter and Tesla, particularly.

Charges of violent crime have dipped or held regular over the previous a number of years within the metropolis of about 808,000 individuals. Nationwide crime information confirmed that town’s homicide charge in 2020 was low in comparison with that of different main American cities.

Nonetheless, the killing has continued to generate waves of recriminations and heightened tensions between town and the tech sector that’s so vital to town’s financial destiny.

Jason Calacanis, a tech investor and entrepreneur, tweeted on Thursday that “anybody who walks a few blocks in San Francisco (exterior of Pac Whites the place issues appear to be oddly secure) is aware of how harmful town is,” utilizing slang to seek advice from the prosperous Pacific Heights neighborhood.

The arrest, which was first reported by Mission Native on Thursday morning, capped days of hypothesis across the loss of life of Mr. Lee, 43, a tech government who was discovered bleeding by emergency medical staff at about 2:35 a.m. on April 4 on a sidewalk. The authorities and relations mentioned he had been in San Francisco on enterprise on the time of the assault.

Police officers declined to debate particulars of the case or the motive, and Mr. Lee’s brother mentioned that his household was not effectively acquainted with the suspect, whom he portrayed as one amongst many tech entrepreneurs in his brother’s orbit.

“From what we’ve discovered lately, it looks like it was extra like entrepreneurs and folks making an attempt to make their identify in San Francisco,” Oliver Lee mentioned. However he added that the household didn’t share his brother’s nearer acquaintance with Mr. Momeni or know why the 2 might need met on the night time the killing occurred.

Mr. Momeni’s LinkedIn profile states that he owns a tech help firm known as Develop IT Inc., which is housed in a loft-like brick house in Emeryville, throughout the bay from San Francisco. Based on his enterprise card, his enterprise focuses on the administration of pc servers, cybersecurity and common I.T. help.

Alameda County courtroom information present that Mr. Momeni was charged in 2011 with unlawful possession of a switchblade and driving with a license that had been suspended due to a previous conviction for driving whereas intoxicated. He pleaded no contest to the suspended license cost, and the knife cost was dismissed.

The fees being filed this week in opposition to Mr. Momeni embody a penalty enhancement for homicide dedicated with a knife.

Sam Singer, a Bay Space public relations government who’s Mr. Momeni’s neighbor within the century-old steam-engine manufacturing unit that has been transformed into workplaces, described Mr. Momeni as an excellent neighbor, calling him “shiny, hard-charging, charming.” Mr. Momeni’s workplace house was “a traditional San Francisco Bay Space tech workplace” with a pool desk, a high-end stereo system and connoisseur meals within the kitchen, Mr. Singer mentioned.

Emptied of workplace staff through the pandemic, downtown San Francisco has skilled a rise in tent encampments and open-air drug use in its public areas, fueling complaints that town’s compassion for homeless and mentally unwell individuals has difficult its capability to take care of order. Property crimes have risen, and sufficient voters felt unsafe that they ousted the native prosecutor, Chesa Boudin, final 12 months.

Within the emotional aftermath of the killing, high-profile figures together with Mr. Musk and Michael Arrington, the founding father of the business weblog TechCrunch, blamed town for Mr. Lee’s loss of life.

San Francisco recorded 56 homicides in 2017, however some violent crimes dipped early within the pandemic. In 2021 and 2022, the murder rely was again as much as 56, based on information from town’s Police Division. Earlier than Mr. Lee’s loss of life, town had recorded a dozen killings this 12 months, two greater than in the identical interval the 12 months earlier than.

Nevertheless, the high-profile crimes have continued to focus on town’s issues. Days after Mr. Lee was killed, for example, a former fireplace commissioner was attacked with a metallic pipe within the Marina District and left hospitalized; the sufferer’s household blamed an encampment of homeless people who he had sought to pressure out of the upscale neighborhood. In March, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors permitted a request from Mayor London Breed to spend an extra $25 million on police extra time.

Mr. Lee was identified by his mates and kinfolk as a form, good man and a beneficiant mentor, but additionally as a prodigiously energetic and social particular person, with a capability to remain out late even on weeknights. His on-line deal with was Loopy Bob, a nickname he had earned whereas taking part in water polo in his youth.

He had risen to prominence first because the chief know-how officer of the cost firm Sq. — which modified its identify to Block in 2021 — after which at MobileCoin, a cryptocurrency start-up based mostly in San Francisco, the place he was chief product officer on the time of his loss of life. Colleagues mentioned Mr. Lee additionally had been instrumental in creating the cell cost service Money App.

HIs brother, who known as the loss “crushing,” described him as an idealist who dreamed of democratizing know-how and who cherished artwork and music. Bob Lee’s friendships had been huge, Oliver Lee mentioned, from the enterprise capital workplaces of Silicon Valley to the common crowds on the annual artwork and music pageant Burning Man. The brother mentioned he had been informed that Mr. Lee had visited a pal earlier on the night time of his loss of life. “Bob,” he mentioned, “would find time for anybody.”

Just like the assault within the Marina District, the stabbing of Mr. Lee occurred in an upscale a part of town referred to as Rincon Hill. A quiet neighborhood that’s widespread with tech staff, the realm is close to downtown and never removed from Google’s workplace and the stadium that’s house to the San Francisco Giants, Oracle Park.

The neighborhood is a tech hub, and it caters by day to tech staff and different professionals with pour-over espresso retailers, grab-and-go lunch counters and a specialty grocery retailer. However the streets are likely to empty after darkish as residents retreat into skyscraper condominiums.

Earlier than shifting to Miami — Mr. Lee informed mates that he preferred the power of town’s tech start-ups — he lived in Mill Valley, an prosperous neighborhood about 15 miles north of San Francisco in Marin County. Mr. Lee lately had shared a house along with his father, based on his father’s social media posts.

“Life has been an journey with two bachelors residing collectively, and I’m so completely happy that we had been capable of turn out to be so shut these final years,” the daddy, Rick Lee, posted on Fb. “Bob would provide the shirt off his again. He would by no means look down on anybody and adhered to a strict no-judgment philosophy.”

Kalley Huang, Tim Arango and Kate Conger contributed reporting. Susan C. Beachy contributed analysis.