Lebanese national Mohammad Ibrahim Bazzi, 60, pleaded guilty today to conspiracy to conduct and to cause U.S. persons to conduct unlawful transactions with a Specially Designated Global Terrorist.
In May 2018, the Department of the Treasury, Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) designated Bazzi as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist for assisting in, sponsoring and providing financial, material and technological support and financial services to Hizballah.
Hizballah is a foreign terrorist organization that, since the 1980s, engaged in numerous terrorist activities, including attacks against American military members, government employees and civilians abroad.
According to the OFAC designation, Bazzi is a key Hizballah financier who has provided millions of dollars to Hizballah over the years, generated from his business activities in Belgium, Lebanon, Iraq and throughout West Africa. As a result of the designation, Bazzi’s interest in any property in the United States was blocked, and all U.S. persons were generally prohibited from transacting business with, or for the benefit of, Bazzi.
Following Bazzi’s designation and according to the court documents, Bazzi and his co-defendant, Talal Chanine, who remains at large in Lebanon, conspired to force or induce an individual located in the United States (U.S. Person) to liquidate their interests in certain real estate assets located in Michigan and covertly transfer hundreds of thousands of dollars in proceeds of the liquidation out of the United States to Bazzi and Chahine in Lebanon without the required OFAC licenses, in violation of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA).
During recorded communications, Bazzi and Chahine proposed numerous methods to conceal from OFAC and law enforcement officials that Bazzi was both the source and destination of the proceeds of the sale and to create the false appearance that the U.S. Person was conducting legitimate arms-length transactions unrelated to Bazzi and Chahine.
For example, Bazzi and Chahine proposed that the funds be transferred through a third party in China as part of a fictitious purchase of restaurant equipment from a Chinese manufacturer, a third party in Lebanon as part of a fictitious real estate purchase, Chahine’s family members in Kuwait as part of fictitious intra-family loans, and as part of a fictitious franchising agreement as payment for the rights to operate a Lebanese-based restaurant chain throughout the United States.
Bazzi was arrested in February 2023 by Romanian law enforcement authorities and subsequently extradited to the Eastern District of New York. The Justice Department thanks the Romanian authorities for their assistance in this matter.
A sentencing hearing will be scheduled at a later date. Bazzi faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison. He has also agreed to forfeit the nearly $830,000 involved in the illegal transaction and to be removed from the United States upon completion of his sentence. A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.
