Police are providing a $100,000 reward to anybody with info that may result in the placement of Elnaz Hajtamiri, a yr after she was kidnapped from a house in Wasaga Seaside, Ont.
“Her household is grieving her absence and has lived via a yr with restricted solutions,” mentioned Ontario Provincial Police Det.-Insp. Martin Graham at a Thursday morning information convention to announce the reward.
“We can’t think about the ache they’re experiencing.”
The reward cash is being supplied via a joint effort by the OPP and York Regional Police.
The OPP have mentioned the 37-year-old was forcibly taken by three masked males wearing police gear on the night time of Jan. 12, 2022, from a relative’s home within the well-liked lakeside city.
The boys drove away with Hajtamiri in what investigators imagine was a white, 2016 to 2022-model Lexus RX 350 SUV. She has not been seen or heard from since.
“The smallest bit of data, as at all times, might be able to carry decision to a household that’s distraught and determined for solutions,” Graham mentioned, including that ideas will be submitted to police instantly or anonymously via Crime Stoppers.
Graham additionally learn a press release from Fariba Hajtamiri, Elnaz’s mom.
“Nothing weighs extra closely on our souls than the concept we might by no means know what occurred to Elnaz. We all know there are individuals on the market who’ve info and who could also be considering coming ahead,” she wrote.
“We pray that you’ll do the precise factor and assist us out of this struggling, and produce justice for Elnaz.”
Sketches launched
Hajtamiri, who was born in Iran, got here to Canada in 2018 and located work within the import-export delivery trade, in keeping with her household. She had just lately left her job to give attention to constructing a cake-making enterprise.
Police launched composite sketches of two of the masked males, based mostly on particulars supplied by two eyewitnesses to the kidnapping, in addition to temporary written descriptions of the trio.
“Although the pictures are restricted because of the suspects carrying masks, please look carefully at their eyes and their options. Somebody is aware of these males,” Graham mentioned.
Police supplied these composite sketches of two of three males needed for Hajtamiri’s abduction. (Ontario Provincial Police handouts)
All three wore darkish jackets over faux police vests, and balaclavas with white trim that they pulled over their noses and mouths, he mentioned. Additionally they had faux police badges chained round their necks.
Graham mentioned he has by no means been concerned in a case like this in his practically 32 years as a police officer.
” A feminine, not concerned in crime, is actually plucked out of her home, with violence, and nothing has been seen or heard of from her in a single calendar yr. That’s extremely uncommon and disturbing,” he mentioned.
One other tried kidnapping simply weeks earlier
Solely weeks earlier than she was kidnapped in Wasaga Seaside, Hajtamiri was assaulted with a frying pan throughout an tried abduction in an underground parking zone in Richmond Hill, Ont., in December 2021. She was badly injured in the course of the assault and went to dwell with household in Wasaga Seaside after discussing doable choices with police.
Her ex-boyfriend, 35-year-old Mohamad Lilo, was charged with tried homicide and tried kidnapping in reference to the sooner assault. Two different males, Riyasat Singh and Harshdeep Binner, confronted the identical charges. Singh finally pleaded responsible to aggravated assault and was deported from Canada final month, in keeping with York police. Lilo and Binner’s circumstances each stay earlier than the courts.
Lilo was additionally charged with kidnapping in Hajtamiri’s abduction in Wasaga Seaside. He was not one of many three masked males, Graham mentioned Thursday. CBC Toronto reported in April 2022 that Lilo had employed a non-public investigator to look at Hajtamiri earlier than she was kidnapped.
Graham wouldn’t say if Lilo, Singh or Binner had co-operated with police after their respective arrests. He added that investigators have explored a number of doable motives within the case. Complicating the seek for Hajtamiri is that Lilo beforehand owned a delivery container enterprise that moved containers all through Canada and the world, Graham mentioned.
When requested if he believes Hajtamiri remains to be alive, Graham mentioned he didn’t know.
“My largest hope is that she is alive. My biggest worry is that she is just not.”
