SAN FRANCISCO — A technology consultant charged with murder in the stabbing death of Cash App founder Bob Lee sparred with the attorney general at a hearing Thursday, interrupting questions with his own questions while being questioned about his testimony.

Nima Momeni, 40, had to be told by the judge several times to give sensitive answers.

He broke his public silence after 18 months when he took the witness stand Wednesday describing how Lee was found dazed on a deserted street in downtown San Francisco at 2:30 a.m. on April 4, 2023, leaving trails of blood and calling for help. He later died in hospital.

Momeni stated that Lee, 43, suddenly pulled a knife on himself after breaking a bone. “bad joke” He suggested Lee should spend his last night on the town with his family instead of going to a strip club. He said Lee then walked away without showing any signs of being injured.

His testimony stunned Lee’s father, brother and ex-wife, who remained adamant in the criminal case. They say Lee was kind-hearted and kind, and close to his two children and ex-wife.

“You saw Nima being the aggressor on the stand, you just saw her trying to take control of this room, her arrogance and authority is on full display here,” said Timothy Oliver Lee, the victim’s brother. Journalists outside the courtroom on Thursday.

“This is crazy,” he said. “This is all ridiculous.”

The trial is in its fifth week. If convicted, Momeni faces 26 years to life in prison.

Lee’s death stunned everyone technology community While fellow executives and engineers praise the charismatic entrepreneur’s generosity and intelligence. He was chief product officer of cryptocurrency platform MobileCoin at the time of his death.

Prosecutors say Momeni He planned the April 4 attack Following a dispute involving Lee’s younger sister, Khazar Momeni, with whom he was friends. Momeni had picked up his sister from the home of a drug dealer Lee had introduced her to and said she may have been sexually assaulted after taking a date-rape drug called GHB.

They say Momeni became angry with Lee, so he took a knife from his sister’s house and, after the couple were kicked out of his house at 2 a.m., took Lee to a secluded area and stabbed him three times before running away.

Deputy district attorney Omid Talai grilled Momeni on Thursday about details of exactly how the attack took place. He asked Momeni why she didn’t call the police after the attack and learning Lee was dead, and why she didn’t respond to her sister’s text asking where she had left Lee.

Momeni said she did not learn of Lee’s death until the next day and was stunned by her sister’s question. He said he thought Lee might have been stabbed by someone else shortly after he saw him walk away unharmed.

Answering the questions, Momeni said that he did not know what the prosecutor meant, that he accused him of misrepresenting his statements and that he had already answered.

At one point, San Francisco Superior Court Judge Alexandra Gordon said the prosecutor had no obligation to provide her with printouts of the texts she was questioning or to put them on a multimedia screen.

“I understand,” said Momeni, dressed in a blue suit and tie. “Thank you for explaining.”

Prosecutors have video showing Lee and Momeni leaving Khazar Momeni’s home after 2 a.m. and driving off in Momeni’s BMW. The video also shows two men getting out of the car at an isolated spot near the Bay Bridge.

Prosecutors say this is where Momeni stabbed Lee, while the defense says this is where Lee attacked Momeni; unstable and aggressive from a days-long bender of cocaine, ketamine and booze.

Momeni’s DNA was seen on the handle of the knife recovered from the area where Lee was stabbed, but the defense said the following: the arm should have been tested for fingerprints, namely Lee’s.

Momeni said Lee and his sister were on friendly terms when he left his home, but prosecutors said the defendant questioned the entrepreneur about what might have happened to his sister at the drug dealer’s home earlier in the evening.

The prosecutor said several times on Thursday that Momeni interrogated himself in the same way he interrogated Lee.

In a letter submitted to the court in support of her son’s marriage proposal, Nima Momeni wrote that she was 14 years old when her mother, Mahnaz Tayarani, took her and Hazar to the USA, escaping from Iran and her husband, who had been abusive and violent towards the family for years. pre-trial broadcast.

He was seated on one side of the courtroom and Lee’s family members were seated on the other.