HOLLYWOOD—On Wednesday, October 30, the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office announced that Arman Mave Hazarian, 48, aka Dean Hazrian, of Tarzana and his business partner Afshin Haserri, 48, aka Al Hashemi, of Hollywood pleaded no contest to three felony counts of grand theft of an automobile and one felony count of grand theft of cash.
Both defendants admitted to stealing about four million dollars in cash and luxury automobiles from victims from 2017 to February 2019 in a subleasing scam.
Hazrian and Hashemi lured their victims by using online ads to convince investors to purchase or lease high-end vehicles and turn the vehicles over to them at a profit.
According to court testimony, Hazarian and Haserri made a profit selling the vehicles to other buyers and keeping the cash, leaving the victims financially responsible.
Multiple vehicles were provided to the defendants causing each victim up to $750,000 in losses. According to the prosecutor, more than 40 luxury cars such as Bentley, Lexus, Jaguar, Mercedes Benz, BMW, and Rolls Royce were lost, some of the vehicles were never recovered.
Hazazian admitted to embezzling $500,000 through fraud and stealing property valued in the sum of more than $3.2 million. Under the terms negotiated in the plea agreement, Hazarian is expected to be sentenced to 9 years and Hashemi is expected to be sentenced to 4 years in state prison. Both men will pay restitution to the 11 people named in the felony complaint.
In an email to Canyon News, a year-long investigation was conducted by the California Department of Motor Vehicles, the Los Angeles Police Department, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, and the California Highway Patrol as part of the Taskforce for Regional Auto-theft Prevention (TRAP).
