Paula Canny, the defense attorney for Nima Momeni, the suspect in last month’s murder of Cash App founder Bob Lee, blamed the victim for his death, pointing out that the tech executive had drugs in his system at the time and was therefore probably acting like a “drug person.”
“There’s a lot of drugs in Bob Lee’s system. I mean, Bob Lee’s system is like the Walgreens of recreational drugs,” Canny told reporters outside the Hall of Justice in San Francisco on Tuesday, according to a report by NBC News.
Bob Lee stabbed to death in San Francisco
Canny’s comments come after an autopsy report revealed that Lee had consumed alcohol, cocaine, and ketamine before he was killed.
“What happens when people take drugs? Generally, they act like drug people, and what drug people act like is not themselves, not happy-go-lucky,” Momeni’s defense attorney added. “Just kind of illusory and make bad decisions and do bad things.”
The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner also noted that Lee had cocaethylene — a compound that forms when alcohol and cocaine mix — in his system when he died.
The 43-year-old tech executive also had metabolized byproducts of cocaine and ketamine in his system, as well as the allergy medication cetirizine, commonly known by the brand name Zyrtec.
The report, however, did not link those substances and Lee’s cause of death. Instead, the tech executive’s cause of death was listed as multiple stab wounds, with the manner and method of death being homicide by sharp injury.
The report noted that Lee was stabbed three times: once on a hip, and twice on the chest, with the chest wounds being 2 to 3 inches deep, piercing the “right lateral anterior inferior ventricle of the heart” and the “right posterior lateral inferior ventricle.”
Lee was stabbed to death in San Francisco, California, on April 4. While the crime was initially suspected to be a random attack, it was later discovered that the 38-year-old suspect, Nima Momeni, is a fellow tech executive that actually knew Lee.
Court documents show that the suspect and Lee had allegedly gotten into an argument over Momeni’s sister before the fatal stabbing.
Momeni’s sister had also allegedly sent a text to Lee, which read, “Just wanted to make sure your doing ok Cause know nima came wayyyyyy down hard on you.”
On Tuesday, the arraignment and bail hearing for Momeni, who now faces murder charges, was postponed to May 18.
You can follow Alana Mastrangelo on Facebook and Twitter at @ARmastrangelo, and on Instagram.