FBI Arrests Iranian-American CEO Who Allegedly Funneled 250 Tons of US Tech to Iran’s Nuclear Program — and Bought a $35 Million Mansion With the Proceeds

• $35 million — Newport Coast, Orange County mansion being seized under civil forfeiture as alleged proceeds of IEEPA sanctions violations — DOJ Central District of California, June 2026
• 250+ metric tons — of US-origin semiconductor and dual-use electronics technology allegedly transferred by Ghomi to Iran’s nuclear and defense programs over ~10 years — DOJ charging documents
• 10 years — approximate duration of the alleged IEEPA violation scheme operated through Ghomi’s Tehran-based company Faraz Pardaz Rayaneh (FPR) — DOJ Central District of California
• AEOI + MODAFL — the two sanctioned Iranian entities that allegedly received US technology — the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran and the Iranian Ministry of Defense; both on Treasury’s SDN list — US Treasury OFAC SDN List

Jamshid Ghomi, 63, a dual US-Iranian national and CEO of a Tehran-based technology company, was arrested by the FBI and charged with conspiracy to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). Federal prosecutors in the Central District of California allege Ghomi spent approximately a decade systematically shipping American semiconductor manufacturing equipment and dual-use electronics to Iran’s nuclear energy body and its defense research ministry — two of the most tightly sanctioned entities in the world.

The proceeds, prosecutors allege, didn’t go back to Tehran. They went to Newport Coast, one of the most expensive ZIP codes in California, where Ghomi purchased a $35 million mansionnow being seized by the federal government under civil forfeiture. The government’s theory is straightforward: the mansion and other luxury assets were purchased with money derived from illegal sanctions violations, making them subject to forfeiture regardless of the outcome of the criminal case.

Assistant US Attorneys Bill Essayli (R-CA) and David Lachmanof the Central District of California are prosecuting. This is not a spy defector case. Ghomi is not charged with stealing US secrets or passing classified information. The allegation is a decade-long technology export violation — the kind of case the export-control enforcement community calls a “gray market pipeline” to a sanctioned state.

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The FBI arrested Ghomi at his Newport Coast property in Orange County. Newport Coast is an unincorporated coastal community in the City of Newport Beach — a neighborhood where median home prices routinely exceed $5 million. A $35 million residence there is, by any measure, a fortress of accumulated wealth. Federal agents allege that fortress was financed by a decade of illegal exports to two of Iran’s most sensitive state entities.

Ghomi holds dual US-Iranian citizenship. That citizenship status is central to the legal theory against him. Under IEEPA and its implementing regulations — specifically the Iranian Transactions and Sanctions Regulations (ITSR) — a US person(which includes any US citizen regardless of dual nationality) is prohibited from exporting goods, services, or technology to Iran without a specific license. Ghomi’s American citizenship made him subject to those rules. His Iranian citizenship and his Tehran-based company gave him the network to evade them — allegedly.

The criminal charge is conspiracy to violate IEEPA, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison and fines up to $1 million per violation — or twice the amount of the transaction, whichever is greater. The civil forfeiture proceeding against the mansion and other assets runs on a lower burden of proof and moves independently of the criminal case.

“Today we charged Jamshid Ghomi with illegally funneling American technology to Iran's nuclear and defense programs over a decade, funded by the proceeds of that crime — including his $35 million Newport Coast mansion.”

AUSA Bill Essayli (@BillEssayli), Central District of California — announcing the Ghomi arrest, June 2026

Faraz Pardaz Rayaneh — transliterated from Persian as roughly “Brilliant Computer Processing” — is a Tehran-based technology company of which Ghomi serves as CEO. According to the DOJ charging documents, FPR functioned as the collection and distribution point for US-origin technology that Ghomi allegedly procured through his American citizenship and business contacts, then shipped or arranged to ship to Iran.

The technology at issue includes semiconductor manufacturing equipment and dual-use electronics — components that have both commercial and military/nuclear applications. Semiconductor fab equipment is among the most tightly controlled categories of US export-controlled goods; a single advanced machine tool can be valued in the millions of dollars and can enable the production of chips used in weapons guidance systems, centrifuge control systems, and radar.

The alleged recipients — Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization (AEOI) and the Iranian Ministry of Defense and Armed Forces Logistics (MODAFL) — are both on the US Treasury Department’s Specially Designated Nationals (SDN) list. Any US person who knowingly provides goods or services to an SDN entity violates the sanctions regime, independent of any criminal classification of that entity. The AEOI runs Iran’s civilian nuclear program and its nuclear research facilities; the overlap between civilian and weapons-relevant nuclear work has been a central concern of the IAEA for two decades.

For roughly ten years — the specific start and end dates will be detailed in the charging documents — Ghomi allegedly used his position as a US person to source technology that Iranian entities could not legally obtain directly, route it through FPR, and deliver it to AEOI and MODAFL. The volume alleged — over 250 metric tons — is not a single shipment or an opportunistic side deal. Two hundred fifty metric tons over ten years is a logistics operation. It implies warehousing, freight forwarding, customs documentation, and — crucially — a financial system capable of receiving payment from sanctioned Iranian entities without triggering OFAC flags.

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The Ghomi case is drawing comparisons in some coverage to the Monica Witt case — the Air Force counterintelligence officer who defected to Iran in 2013 and was indicted in 2019 for providing US classified information to Iranian intelligence officers. The two cases are substantively different and should not be conflated.

Witt was charged under the Espionage Act. She allegedly stole US classified information and passed it to Iranian intelligence handlers. That is classic espionage: betrayal of secrets to a foreign adversary. Ghomi is charged under IEEPA — a sanctions and export control statute. He is not alleged to have stolen US secrets, recruited US sources, or passed classified material. He is alleged to have been a commercially motivated conduit: an American who used his citizenship and business access to supply controlled technology to sanctioned buyers for profit.

That distinction matters legally — the statutes, elements, and penalties are different — but it does not diminish the national security significance of the alleged conduct. A semiconductor fab tool delivered to AEOI is arguably more operationally useful to Iran’s weapons program than a classified briefing, because a machine tool can be used to manufacture components indefinitely while a classified briefing has a shelf life.

The civil forfeiture proceeding is legally distinct from the criminal prosecution. To seize the Newport Coast mansion, the government does not need to obtain a criminal conviction — it needs to prove by a preponderance of evidence (more likely than not) that the property is the proceeds of, or was used to facilitate, a violation of IEEPA. That is a significantly lower bar than the “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard in the criminal case.

The government’s theory, as alleged in the charging documents, is that payments from AEOI and MODAFL to FPR — and ultimately to Ghomi personally — were the source of funds used to purchase the Newport Coast property and other luxury assets. Tracing those funds requires establishing the chain: AEOI/MODAFL payment → FPR account → currency conversion → US wire transfer → property purchase. That financial chain is, in export-control cases, typically the most document-intensive part of the prosecution.

Newport Coast real estate at the $35 million level is not purchased anonymously. Transactions of that size generate extensive escrow records, wire transfer documentation, title insurance files, and loan application records (if any financing was involved). The government would have had to trace and freeze those records before executing the civil forfeiture filing — a process that typically takes months of pre-arrest financial investigation by agents from Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) or the FBI’s financial crimes unit.

The forfeiture of the mansion — if completed — would be one of the largest single residential asset forfeitures in a US export-control case. More common outcomes in IEEPA forfeiture proceedings involve financial accounts, business equipment, and vehicles. A $35 million residential property signals either unusual prosecutorial ambition or an unusually strong paper trail.

The Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) is Iran’s primary nuclear civilian authority — it runs the Bushehr nuclear power plant, the Isfahan uranium conversion facility, and the Natanz and Fordow enrichment sites. It is also the entity that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has spent two decades attempting to inspect more comprehensively. The IAEA’s 2022 and 2023 reports documented evidence of undeclared nuclear material and activities at sites the AEOI initially denied even existed.

The US placed the AEOI on the SDN list not because it is inherently a weapons program — Iran maintains that Bushehr is civilian energy production — but because the dual-use nature of enrichment technology means that advanced manufacturing equipment delivered to AEOI can, at minimum, shorten the timeline to weapons-grade capability. Every centrifuge cascade improvement, every precision machining capability, and every advanced electronic control system delivered to Natanz is a marginal improvement in breakout speed.

MODAFL — the Ministry of Defense and Armed Forces Logistics — is the other alleged recipient. MODAFL oversees Iran’s conventional weapons development, its ballistic missile program (through the Aerospace Industries Organization, a MODAFL subsidiary), and elements of its drone and cruise missile production. Semiconductor and dual-use electronics delivered to MODAFL touch the guidance, targeting, and electronic warfare capabilities of those programs.

Both entities have been the target of every major round of US sanctions escalation since 2006. The allegation that a US citizen spent a decade supplying both simultaneously — while purchasing a $35 million house in Orange County with the proceeds — is, if proven, one of the more brazen export-control cases in the DOJ’s sanctions enforcement history.

The timing of the arrest — coming during a period of US-Iran nuclear diplomacy — adds a political dimension that neither the DOJ charging documents nor the civil forfeiture filing address. IEEPA enforcement is an executive-branch prerogative; the current DOJ and Treasury are signaling, by bringing this case, that sanctions enforcement against Iran’s nuclear and defense entities remains active regardless of the diplomatic track.

Ghomi is presumed innocent and has not yet entered a plea. His attorneys have not issued a public statement as of the time of this report. The civil forfeiture proceeding against the Newport Coast mansion will proceed on a separate schedule from the criminal prosecution, and Ghomi has the right to contest the forfeiture in federal court.

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