Suspect arrested in Scotland for trail of crimes in US found on ventilator with COVID-19
Jan 13, 2022, 5:19 PM | Updated: Jan 14, 2022, 11:49 am
FILE PHOTO: Utah County Attorney David Leavitt is pictured at a press conference in Salt Lake City on September 14, 2021. (Scott Winterton, Deseret News)
(Scott Winterton, Deseret News)
PROVO, Utah — Additional details have been released regarding a man who was arrested this week for a sexual assault in Utah County back in 2008. The man, Nicholas Rossi, (also known to go by the alias Nicholas Alahverdian,) was a wanted suspect for various crimes across the United States and was ultimately found and arrested in Scotland.
When investigators were finally able to track down Rossi, he was found in a hospital bed on a ventilator with COVID-19.
According to court documents, Rossi was wanted for criminal cases of sexual assault, harassment, and possible kidnapping from 2007-2019. Police reports involving Rossi were obtained from Rhode Island, Ohio, Utah and Massachusetts.
The documents allege that Rossi raped a former girlfriend he had met on myspace.com and briefly dated in Utah County. The woman reported the sexual assault to a local hospital and her rape kit was tested as part of the “sexual assault kit initiative” in 2017. The DNA found connected investigators to Rossi.
According to court documents, Rossi showed a pattern of this type of behavior, usually getting to know a woman online, then meeting her in a public place, and eventually meeting up privately where Rossi would typically initiate some type of inappropriate contact. The court documents say that when these women would attempt to leave Rossi would threaten suicide or force some type of sexual contact.
The court documents also note that Rossi has been previously married twice and that in both cases, the ex-wife had filed for a protective order due to the nature of the physical and emotional abuse Rossi inflicted.
In a statement, Utah County Attorney David Leavitt said, “Our office is grateful for the significant interagency collaboration of law enforcement to bring this suspect to justice. We credit Utah’s Sexual Assault Kit Initiative grant funded through the Department of Justice and the Bureau of Justice Assistance as playing a significant role in testing backlogged kits and ultimately identifying the suspect.”
It is believed that there are more victims of Nicholas Rossi. Any person believed to be a victim of a crime by Rossi is encouraged to reach out to the State Bureau of Investigation at (801) 965-4747, SAKI Agents, or the Utah County Attorney’s Office (801) 851-8026.
