Arthur Knight, aka Nicholas Alahverdian, found guilty of rape and years of denying case an identity
Nicholas Alahverdian, also known as Nicholas Rossi, was convicted of rape in Utah on Wednesday after a three-day trial in Salt Lake County, years after he faked his death and fled the U.S. to avoid charges.
The 38-year-old, who used several different aliases over the years, was found guilty of raping a former girlfriend in 2008 after a brief whirlwind romance that started after the pair met on MySpace.
Alahverdian, who appeared in court in a wheelchair while wearing a suit and an oxygen mask, declined to testify at the trial.
Prosecutors detailed how he used charm to manipulate a 24-year-old woman recovering from a traumatic brain injury. What started as financial control, such as demanding she covered the cost of dates, car repairs and loans, quickly escalated to physical assault, they said.
During the trial, the victim testified that Alahverdian’s behavior turned controlling and hostile soon after she purchased their engagement rings and lent him money for rent. She said that when she took off the ring and ended the relationship, it led to an argument and he eventually assaulted her in his Salt Lake City apartment.
Alahverdian, who pled not guilty, faces five years to life in prison for the charge and is scheduled to be sentenced on October 20.
“We are grateful to the survivor in this case for her willingness to come forward, years after this attack took place,” Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill said in a statement. “We appreciate her patience as we worked to bring the defendant back to Salt Lake County so that this trial could take place and she could get justice. It took courage and bravery to take the stand and confront her attacker to hold him accountable.”
Alahverdian first came under suspicion in Utah when his DNA was matched to a rape kit as part of a statewide drive to clear testing backlogs in 2018. Months after being charged, an online obituary, dated February 29, 2020, claimed he had died of non-Hodgkin lymphoma. But Rhode Island law enforcement, alongside his former attorneys and foster family, doubted his death.
The deception ended in 2021 when hospital workers in Glasgow recognized Alahverdian through his tattoos and matched him to Interpol notices while he was being treated for COVID-19. He was arrested the same year.
Alahverdian claimed he was the victim of mistake identity, and that he was in fact an Irish-born orphan called Arthur Knight who had never been to the U.S. The tattoos, he claimed, had been given to him in the hospital as an attempt to frame him.
Legal proceedings rumbled on for years until he was finally extradited to Utah in January 2024 to face charges related to the Salt Lake County case.
He formally acknowledged he and the alias Arthur Knight were the same person at an October 2024 bail hearing. Investigators believe he used at least a dozen different identities to avoid capture over the years.
Alahverdian still faces a second rape trial in nearyby Utah County, which is scheduled for mid-September.
He was previously wanted in Rhode Island for failing to register as a sex offender, the Associated Press reported. The FBI has said he also faces fraud charges in Ohio, where he was also convicted of sex-related charges in 2008.
Alahverdian has been the subject of multiple documentaries, including the four-part Imposter: The Man Who Came Back from the Dead on the British Channel 4, as well as a December 2024 episode of Dateline NBC.
Jury selection in his Utah County rape case begins September 15.
