A 44-year-old Woodland Hills woman was arrested at Los Angeles International Airport on Saturday night on suspicion of trafficking arms for the Iranian government, U.S. officials announced on Sunday, April 19.
Shamim Mafi is charged in a federal complaint with brokering the sale of drones, bombs, bomb fuses and millions of rounds of ammunition manufactured by Iran and sold to Sudan. That country is now in its fourth year of a civil war that has killed at least 59,000 people.
Sales of Iranian weapons are prohibited under U.S. government sanctions, and Mafi did not obtain a license or written approval from the U.S. State Department to broker them, according to the criminal complaint, filed in U.S. District Court on April 18.
She is accused of violating the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and the Arms Export Control Act.
“As was made clear by DAG (Deputy Attorney General) Todd Blanche, anyone who violates United States sanctions laws will be vigorously prosecuted by the DOJ,” First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli posted on X on Sunday.
Search warrants found evidence of 62 contacts between Mafi and Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security officials, according to an FBI agent assigned to the Iran Counterintelligence Squad out of the Los Angeles office.
Shamim Mafi, 44 (Courtesy of FBI)
Mafi is an Iranian national born in Iran in 1981, and she lived there until 2013, according to the complaint. She became a permanent resident of the United States in 2016. She lives in Woodland Hills and “frequently travels to Iran, Turkey, Oman and other countries,” the complaint states.
She was under surveillance since 2021, federal authorities said. The complaint details communications about how to receive payment for weapons using nontraditional means that are less likely to be tracked, and Mafi’s activities involved “a high degree of sophistication” and “substantial sums of money,” it states.
Mafi was seen at her condominium complex in Woodland Hills as recently as April 13, authorities said, and was arrested at LAX as she prepared to leave the country. She was traveling to Istanbul, Turkey, according to the FBI.
The complaint alleges that Mafi and an unnamed co-conspirator brokered weapons deals on Iran’s behalf through Atlas International, also known as Atlas Global Holding and Atlas Tech LLC.
In one instance detailed in the complaint, Mafi facilitated a contract for Iranian-made drones worth $70.6 million to Sudan. She also brokered the sale of 55,000 bomb fuses to the Sudanese government. As part of those transactions, Mafi sent a letter of intent to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) “to purchase the bomb fuses for Sudan.”
The IRGC was declared a foreign terrorist organization by the U.S. Secretary of State in 2019.
The complaint also cites evidence that Mafi and a co-conspirator attempted to broker sales of AK-47 machine guns along with 240 million rounds of ammunition to the Sudanese Ministry of Defense.
A suitcase full of cash is dispayed as evidence in the Iran arms trafficking case against Shamim Mafi of Woodland Hills. (Courtesy of FBI)
Mafi was aware of the sanctions on Iran and “the illicit nature of her arms brokering activities,” the complaint says. It also says she had knowledge of the Iranian financial systems “and money laundering channels used by the Government of Iran”.
She also is accused of telling her conspirators and other people not to discuss the weapons deals by telephone, and to delete any messages referring to the deals. Payments were to be made “in small amounts” and only in cash to avoid U.S. scrutiny, the complaint says.
News reports dating back to 2022 say Iran has been funding and arming the military in the Sudan civil war. Sudan last week entered a fourth year of war that, in addition to killing 59,000 people, has forced 13 million to flee their homes.
Mafi is expected to make her initial appearance Monday afternoon in U.S. District Court in downtown Los Angeles.
If convicted, she faces a statutory maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
