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Three Iranian Jewish men Murdered in West Hollywood, suspect arrested

On the evening of Aug. 26, Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies found three men identified as Iranian Jews shot to death inside an apartment located in the 600 block of North Kings Road in West Hollywood.
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September 1, 2010

On the evening of Aug. 26, Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies found three men identified as Iranian Jews shot to death inside an apartment located in the 600 block of North Kings Road in West Hollywood.

The victims were identified as Pirooz Moussazadeh, 27; his brother, Shahriar Moussazadeh, 38; and Bernard Khalili, 27, according to Craig Harvey, chief of investigations for the Los Angeles County coroner’s office.

On Aug. 30, Harold Yong Park, 31, of East Hollywood was arrested in connection with the three homicides and, investigators say, the robbery of several pounds of marijuana.

According to Dara Abaei, head of the Pico-Robertson-based Jewish Unity Network, Khalili was the brother of Bianca Khalili, a Beverly Hills High School senior who in 2008 fell from the roof of a Century City high-rise. Los Angeles police ruled Bianca Khalili’s death a suicide.

Deputies arrived at the West Hollywood apartment just after 9 p.m. on Aug. 26, responding to 911 calls from neighbors who had reported hearing gunshots, a sheriff’s department report says. Sheriff’s officials told local media that no weapons, drugs or signs of forced entry could be found at the apartment.

Abaei, an Iranian Jewish community activist, said local Iranian Jews are expressing shock and fear at the news of the murders.

“Both young people and parents in the community are very upset. I don’t think we as a community have had such a major incident of deaths like this in 25 years — the last one I can remember was in Iran, when three Jewish men were killed in a car accident,” Abaei said.

“This is the worst tragedy in our community in the last 30 years. We all feel the pain of these two families and pray for their peace,” said Mehdi Soroudi, president of the Nessah Synagogue in Beverly Hills.

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