Dec 16, 2014

Man Haron Monis, the gunman behind the 16-hour hostage standoff in Sydney, Australia, resulting in the deaths of two individuals and himself, was well known to Iranian authorities. The self-styled "sheikh," who left Iran for Australia in 1996, had abused Australia’s political system to gain immunity from prosecution in Iran, where he was a wanted man.

According to Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Marzieh Afkham, “The psychological history and condition of this individual, who for more than two decades was a refugee in Australia, was repeatedly presented to Australian officials.”

Afkham did not elaborate, but Haron Monis’ history while in Australia paints a clear picture of him as unstable and a charlatan posing as a religious man.

Before changing his name, Haron Monis was Mohammad Hassan Manteghi. As early as 2008, the Australian Shiite community warned federal agents he was an imposter posing as a Shiite ayatollah (in fact, they said there were no ayatollahs in Australia at the time) and no one had ever heard of the two names he was using, "Ayatollah Borujerdi" and "Sheikh Haron." He was, however, in the news at the time for harassing family members of soldiers who died fighting in Afghanistan.

Before his conversion to Sunnism to take up the cause of the Islamic State group, Haron Monis had faced a number of legal battles, including numerous charges of sexual assault — under the guise of religious "healer" — and accessory to the murder of his ex-wife in Australia.