A man accused of locking a woman in a homemade cell had a handwritten plan and sketch, FBI says

SALEM, Ore. (AP) — The FBI says man accused of kidnapping a Seattle woman and holding her in a homemade cell in Oregon had a list that included a chilling reminder to go after women who wouldn’t be missed to avoid “any kind of an investigation.” Accompanying the bullet-point notes was a sketch of an apparent dungeon, to be built with cinder blocks, foam insulation and waterproof concrete. Police found the legal pad with the notes in the southern Oregon home of a man who is now a suspect in other sexual assaults around the country. Also in the home was a cinder block cell where police say the man, Negasi Zuberi, held the woman from Seattle until she escaped by pounding at the door.

SALEM, Ore. (AP) — He called it “Operation Take Over,” with a list that included a chilling reminder to go after women who wouldn’t be missed to avoid “any kind of an investigation,” according to the FBI.

Accompanying the bullet-point notes was a sketch of an apparent dungeon, to be built with cinder blocks, foam insulation and waterproof concrete.

Police found the legal pad with the notes in the southern Oregon home of a man who is now a suspect in sexual assaults around the country. Also in the home: a cinder block cell where police say the man, Negasi Zuberi, held a woman he had allegedly kidnapped in Seattle until she escaped by pounding at the door with bloodied hands.

Court and police records show Zuberi, 29, had been on law enforcement’s radar before — for alleged offenses such as assaulting the mother of their children, punching someone in the face and being a bad tenant whose landlord sought to evict him.

The FBI set up a website asking possible victims to come forward. The site says the FBI’s investigation has extended to states where Zuberi, who used several aliases, including Sakima, previously resided since August 2016. Those states could include California, Washington, Oregon, Colorado, Utah, Florida, New York, New Jersey, Alabama and Nevada, the site says.

“Sakima has several different methods to gain control of his victims, including drugging their drinks, pretending to be a police officer, and soliciting the services of sex workers and then violently sexually assaulting them,” the FBI said on the website. “Some of the encounters may have been filmed to make it appear as if the assault was consensual.”

In the Seattle kidnapping on July 15, Zuberi solicited a woman for prostitution in an area known for sex work and afterward posed as an undercover police officer, the FBI said Wednesday. He handcuffed her, put her in leg irons and drove to Klamath Falls, Oregon, stopping to rape her on the way, according to court documents. After the woman escaped, Zuberi fled but was arrested by state police in Reno, Nevada, the next afternoon, the FBI said.

Zuberi is married and has at least one child, but the FBI did not say whether they were living in the Klamath Falls home and declined to answer questions about them.

Zuberi did not follow item No. 1 in the “Operation Take Over” plan that police found in the house — a reminder to leave his phone at home, authorities say. FBI Special Agent Travis Gluesenkamp said in an affidavit that GPS location data from Zuberi’s cellphone showed he was in Seattle on July 15. Both his phone and the woman’s phone also traveled from Seattle to Klamath Falls that day, Gluesenkamp said.

Zuberi is now behind bars in Nevada, waiting to be extradited to Oregon, where he is charged in federal court with interstate kidnapping and transporting an individual across state lines with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity.

The case has rattled Klamath Falls, a town of 22,000 residents that is close to the California border and known for bird watching, golfing and fishing.

“I think a lot of people are shocked that something like this happened in our community,” Klamath Falls Police Capt. Rob Reynolds, who is working on the case, said Thursday.

Reynolds said authorities “have reason to believe that there’s prior victims from several states,” but would not disclose details, citing the ongoing investigation.

Since authorities announced the case against Zuberi in a news conference in Portland, Oregon, on Wednesday, some proceedings against him have emerged in court and municipal records.

In 2020, he was accused of attacking and threatening to kill a woman and the children she shares with him, NBC News reported. The woman’s petition seeking a restraining order against Justin Kouassi, one of his known aliases, was filed that year in Contra Costa County, California.

“He physically attacks me, he hits me, he brakes and throws things, he screams at the kids and me,” the woman wrote. “We get woken up every night from him being drunk and loud and scares us.”

It’s unclear whether the restraining order was issued.

Zuberi recently lived in Vancouver, Washington, where court records show the landlord sought to evict him.

Landlord Abishek Kandar said in a text message that Zuberi didn’t pay rent for six months, illegally sublet the home, bred puppies, damaged the property and threatened neighbors.

“He is a horrible person,” Kandar said. “He deserves to be in jail.”

According to court records in Colorado, a man with one of Zuberi’s alleged aliases, Justin Kouassi, was accused of punching a person in the face in Denver last year. An arrest warrant was issued for Kouassi, court records show, but Denver police do not have any record of Zuberi or anyone with one of his aliases being arrested. There is still an active warrant out for him.

Heather Fraley, a lawyer with the federal public defender’s office in Las Vegas who was listed as Zuberi’s attorney, declined to comment Wednesday. Zuberi’s public defender in Oregon, Devin Huseby, on Thursday also declined to comment.

Transferring Zuberi from Nevada can take several weeks, said Kevin Sonoff, a spokesperson for the U.S. attorney’s office in Oregon. Zuberi could face up to life in prison if convicted of the federal charges in Oregon.

After arriving in Klamath Falls on July 15, Zuberi put the woman in the makeshift cell in the garage and said he was leaving to do paperwork, according to the criminal complaint.

The woman “briefly slept and awoke to the realization that she would likely die if she did not attempt to escape,” the complaint says.

She managed to break some of the door’s welded joints, creating a small opening that she climbed through, Reynolds said.

After the woman escaped and flagged down a passing motorist, police came to the house and found the handwritten notes, with plans for an apparent dungeon buried 100 feet (30 meters) below ground.

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Authorities say a man who posed as an undercover police officer kidnapped a woman in Seattle, drove her hundreds of miles to his home in Oregon and locked her in a cinder block cell until she bloodied her hands breaking the door to escape. The FBI said Wednesday (Aug. 2, 2023) that police in Reno, Nevada, arrested 29-year-old Negasi Zuberi on July 16, 2023, a day after he fled from his home in Klamath Falls, where he had taken the Seattle woman. It said he is charged with interstate kidnapping and authorities are searching for additional possible victims after linking him to sexual assaults in at least four other states.

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — A woman who escaped her kidnapper by punching her way out of a homemade cinder block cell at a home in southern Oregon likely saved other women from a similar fate, authorities said, by alerting them to a man they now suspect in sexual assaults in at least four more states.

Negasi Zuberi posed as an undercover police officer when he kidnapped the woman in Seattle, drove hundreds of miles to his home in Klamath Falls and locked her in the garage cell until she bloodied her hands breaking the door to escape, the FBI said Wednesday (Aug. 2, 2023).

Zuberi, 29, faces federal charges that include interstate kidnapping, and authorities said they are looking for additional victims after linking him to the other assaults. Authorities have not yet said publicly in which states those attacks took place.

“This woman was kidnapped, chained, sexually assaulted, and locked in a cinderblock cell,” Stephanie Shark, the assistant special agent in charge of the FBI’s Portland field office, said in a news release. “Police say she beat the door with her hands until they were bloody in order to break free. Her quick thinking and will to survive may have saved other women from a similar nightmare.”

After the woman escaped from his home in Klamath Falls, Zuberi fled the city of roughly 22,000 people but was arrested by state police in Reno, Nevada, the next afternoon, the FBI said.

Court records did not yet list an attorney who might speak on Zuberi’s behalf. He has not yet been assigned a public defender in Oregon as he’s still being transferred from Nevada, which can take several weeks, said Kevin Sonoff, a spokesperson for the U.S. attorney’s office in Oregon.

A grand jury in Portland on Wednesday returned an indictment charging Zuberi with interstate kidnapping and transporting an individual across state lines with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity. He could face up to life in prison if convicted.

According to the FBI, Zuberi also went by the names Sakima, Justin Hyche and Justin Kouassi, and he has lived in multiple states since 2016, possibly including California, Washington, Oregon, Colorado, Utah, Florida, New York, New Jersey, Alabama, and Nevada.

According to a criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Oregon, Zuberi solicited the woman, identified only as Adult Victim 1, in the early-morning hours of July 15 to engage in prostitution along Aurora Avenue in Seattle, an area known for sex work. Afterward, Zuberi told the woman he was an undercover officer, showed her a badge, pointed a stun gun at her and placed her in handcuffs and leg irons before putting her in the back of his vehicle, the complaint says.

He then drove to his home, stopping along the way to sexually assault her, the complaint says. When they arrived about seven hours after he first encountered her in Seattle, he put her in the makeshift cell built from cinder blocks with a door of metal bars and said he was leaving to do paperwork.

The woman “briefly slept and awoke to the realization that she would likely die if she did not attempt to escape,” the complaint says.

She managed to break some of the door’s welded joints, creating a small opening which she climbed through, Klamath Falls Police Capt. Rob Reynolds said at a news conference.

“She repeatedly punched the door with her own hands,” Reynolds said. “She had several lacerations along her knuckles.”

The victim opened Zuberi’s vehicle which was in the garage, grabbed his gun and fled, leaving blood on a wooden fence she climbed over to escape, the complaint says. She flagged down a passing driver, who called 911.

Two Nevada State Patrol officers tracked Zuberi down at a Walmart parking lot in Reno the next day, July 16, the complaint says. He was in his car holding one of his children in the front seat while talking to his wife, who was standing outside the vehicle. He initially refused to get out of the car when the officers asked and instead cut himself with a sharp object and tried to destroy his phone, according to the complaint. Zuberi eventually surrendered, and the child wasn’t harmed.

Investigators interviewed Zuberi’s wife and neighbors, but authorities declined to say if there was any indication that any of them had been aware of the abduction.

A search of Zuberi’s home and garage turned up the Seattle woman’s purse and handwritten notes, according to investigators. One of them was labeled “Operation Take Over” and included a bullet list with entries that read, “Leave phone at home” and “Make sure they don’t have a bunch of ppl (sic) in their life. You don’t want any type of investigation.”

Another handwritten document appeared to include a rough sketch for an underground structure using concrete blocks, foam insulation and waterproof concrete.

The FBI said Zuberi may have used other methods of gaining control of women, including drugging their drinks. The agency said it was setting up a website asking anyone who believes they may have been a victim to come forward.

The Klamath Falls rental home where Zuberi allegedly took the woman is owned by the city’s mayor, Carol Westfall, and her husband, Kevin, according to property records. The house backs onto a park and is on a residential street, less than a quarter-mile (half a kilometer) from a highway.

Court records show that after Zuberi’s arrest, the couple had him evicted.

“We are shocked and dismayed by what has occurred,” the Westfalls, who declined to comment on their interactions with Zuberi, said in an email. “We applaud the actions of the woman who helped capture this person and prevent him from committing further atrocities.”