San Francisco police arrested a suspect Thursday morning over the past week. knife death of Cash App creator and fintech pioneer Bob Leeauthorities said.
San Francisco Police Chief Bill Scott told reporters at an afternoon news conference that Nima Momeni, 38, was arrested at her home in Emeryville, a suburb between Oakland and Berkeley.
Lee and Momeni, owner of technology company Expand IT, knew each other, the police chief said.
“Our investigators worked tirelessly to make this arrest and bring this case to the Lee family for trial, just as we would with every homicide that occurs in this city,” Scott said.
District Attorney Brooke Jenkins said Momeni is charged with murder and a special charge of murder with a knife.
Jenkins told reporters that Momeni was not an “immediate suspect” in the case, but had been identified through an extensive police investigation.
He will be arraigned Friday afternoon and prosecutors will ask a judge to deny him bail, Jenkins said.
The news of Momeni's arrest was first published by the publication Local Mission.
Police found Lee, 43, with stab wounds in the city center at about 2:35 a.m. on April 4. He was taken to a nearby hospital but died from his injuries.
Some in technology, including Twitter owner Elon Muskused Lee's murder to denounce the city as dangerous and criticize what they believed soft liberal crime policy.
“Many people I know have been violently attacked. Violent crime in San Francisco is horrendous, and even when the attackers are caught, they are often immediately released,” Musk tweeted on April 5. “Is the city taking stronger action to incarcerate repeat violent offenders @BrookeJenkinsSF?
Speaking at a news conference, Jenkins criticized Musk by name, as well as others who made “reckless and irresponsible statements” about Lee's killing.
Jenkins said the statements “mislead the world in their perception of San Francisco and also negatively impact justice for crime victims by spreading misinformation.”
Scott also said Lee's murder could have happened in any city. “This is more about human nature and human behavior than it is about our city,” he said.
At the time of his death, Lee was working as director of product at payment company MobileCoin.
He previously served as the first CTO at Square, the e-commerce company founded by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey and now known as Block.
In this role, Lee created the Cash App, which allows users in the US and UK to send money to each other through their mobile phones.
Momeni started Expand IT in 2010, according to his LinkedIn profile. The company provides IT and technology support services to other businesses.
A voicemail seeking comment left with Expand IT was not immediately returned.
In a Facebook post, Lee's brother Tim Oliver Lee thanked police for apprehending the suspect.
“We look forward to working with [the] The District Attorney's Office is investigating this case,” he wrote. “Hopefully our family can now begin the healing process.”
