Who would have thought that a 29-year-old husband and father of two had been holding a woman captive in his home in the quiet suburb of Klamath Falls, Ore? It wasn’t until one victim escaped from his captivity that the man’s alleged schemes were exposed.
The FBI’s Portland Field Office said a Washington woman accused Negasi Zuberi’s of posing as a plainclothes police officer and flashing a badge and Taser to arrest her for prostitution, then abducted her 450 miles away, sexually assaulted her several times and threw her in a makeshift cell in his home chained in handcuffs. She beat her knuckles bloody to bust down the door. Upon her escape, she ran outside and flagged down a driver passing by who called 911. The Klamath Falls Police Department obtained a search warrant for Zuberi’s home but by the time they got there, he’d fled to Nevada where he was cornered by the cops.
He was found parked in a Walmart parking lot, holding one of his children in the front seat having a conversation with his wife. Authorities say when he was approached by the police, he refused to exit the car, cut himself and tried to smash his phone. He was arrested after a 45-minute standoff and the child was unharmed.
Assistant Special Agent in Charge Stephanie Shark said she believes this Washington woman may be only one victim of many.
Read more from NBC News:
Inside the home, law enforcement also recovered handwritten notes including one that said “Operation take over” with the bullet points “leave phone at home” and “make sure they don’t have a bunch of people in their life. You don’t want any type of investigation,” the complaint said.
Shark said Zuberi has been linked to four additional violent sexual assaults in at least four states, though she did not disclose where those cases were. She noted that Zuberi had been living in Oregon for several months before the alleged kidnapping.
Zuberi has lived in 12 states — California, Washington, Oregon, Colorado, Utah, Florida, New York, New Jersey, Michigan, Illinois, Alabama and Nevada — over the last decade, the FBI said. Officials said that he may have used several methods to target victims, including drugging drinks and impersonating a police officer.
It was just weeks ago that another seemingly normal, suburban family man, Rex Heurmann, was arrested in connection to a string of killings known as the Gilgo Beach murders from 14 years ago. He was linked to the murders of four women after their remains were found across the way from his home, per an AP News report.
However, before the cops snatched his DNA sample from a pizza box, he was living life as the average architect working downtown with a wife and children... do y’all know you your neighbors are?