Same performance, different theater: Alahverdian's first court appearance since Scottish extradition
Rhode Island conman and rape suspect Nicholas Alahverdian had his first court appearance Tuesday in Utah since being extradited from Scotland and continued his deception of attempting to be someone else.
The five-minute escapade, complete with muffled answers through an oxygen mask Alahverdian had revived using and his repeated interruptions, threw the court into confusion as it did so many times over two years in Edinburgh.
The judge, seemingly unaware of the Alahverdian backstory, wondered for a moment if she had the right suspect in front of her.
“Are you Mr. Rossi?,” the judge asked, using Alahverdian's former surname, which he is charged under.
Alahverdian mumbled.
“Is that a yes?” the judge asked.
Eventually, 36-year-old Alahverdian, who faked his death in February 2020, managed to say, using some kind of English accent, that his name was Arthur Knight Brown.
He gave his birthdate as “the 22nd of the eleventh, 1986.” His real birthday is July 11, 1987. Nov. 22 is the day in 1963 when Alahverdian’s idol, John F. Kennedy, was assassinated, a date family members say he never forgot.
A clerk interjected: “I think we are having a problem understanding who this person is.”
Finally, a prosecutor offered some clarity into what was going on: “Your honor this individual has been extradited and he has not admitted his name or birthdate accurately and so I don’t think we are going to be successful in that today either.”
Alahverdian, who is charged with two 2008 Utah rapes and a third sexual battery, interrupted: “Objection, my lady. That is complete hearsay.”
Alahverdian was arrested in December 2021 in a Glasgow hospital after authorities tracked him to the United Kingdom through his iCloud account on his cellular phone.
After a prolonged two-year court process, an extradition judge last August ruled the man before him – a man who he said was “as dishonest and deceitful as he is evasive and manipulative” – was indeed Alahverdian.
Alahverdian could offer only a bizarre defense: that hospital staff conspired to ink identifying tattoos on his arms while he was in a COVID coma and that someone else had sent his fingerprints to Utah to match those of the real Alahverdian. He also denied he was the person in Pawtucket police mug shots from a decade ago.
Alahverdian is expected to appear again in court next week for a detention hearing. Until then he is being held without bail in the Utah County Jail.
Contact Tom Mooney at: tmooney@providencejournal.com
This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: In Utah court, Nicholas Alahverdian insists he's not former RI conman
