Ray William Johnson: True Story Podcast - He Cut Off a Man's D**k // The Hossein Nayeri Story

Episode Date: September 21, 2026

Hossein Nayeri and Kyle Handley orchestrated a 2012 plot to abduct and extort a Newport Beach medical marijuana dispensary owner, mistakenly believing the victim had buried 1 million dollars in cash in the Mojave Desert.

What would you do if you heard that there are millions of dollars buried out in the desert? So this all starts with this guy, Kyle. And Kyle is 33 during this time, living in Orange County, California, and Kyle is an interesting guy. Like, he makes his living, growing and selling, married to marijuana to medical dispensaries. And one day in 2012, he takes a trip out to Las Vegas to gamble and party and whatnot with his somewhat rich business partner.

This guy, Michael. Michael is also in the pot business, and he owns a local dispensary back in Newport Beach. So while Kyle and Michael are in Vegas, Michael's got money, so he's paying for everything. Drinks, the hotel, this dude is spending money like it's nothing. So Kyle sees this and he's like, damn, this guy has a lot of cash. Later, he's back home in Orange County and he's talking to his friend. This guy, Hussein. And Hussein is 33.

and he grows and sells Zaza along with his friend Kyle. So Kyle starts telling Hussein that Michael is rich, rich, and he has all this money to throw around. And Hussein hears this, and he starts thinking that maybe Michael is worth robbing, and not just because he's rich. You see, around this time in 2012, the medical marriage of Juana business is in a state of limbo. You see, it's legal in California for medical use,

but not for recreational use, But at the federal level, it's still not legal. And because of these conflicting laws, most banks want to stay away from dispensaries. They refuse to handle money from these types of businesses, which means dispensaries operate entirely by cash, which means a guy like Michael, in theory, would have access to a shitload of this cash at any given time. So Hussein figures that Michael probably has all this money hidden somewhere, not in a bank. And now they just need to figure out where. So for the next seven months or so, Hussein starts watching Michael, tracking him, stalking him.

He even goes and Loki puts GPS trackers on each of Michael's cars. And from his laptop, he starts keeping track of everywhere Michael goes. And after tracking him for a while, Hussein notices that Michael makes several trips out to the Mojave Desert. And this is a 142-mile trip, so it's far away for him. But for some reason, Michael chooses to drive out there. And the more Hussein follows his movements, the more convinced he becomes that Michael is hiding about a million dollars cash buried somewhere out in the Mojave. So Hussein, Kyle, and another goon come up with a plan to get that money. They're going to kidnap Michael.

And so one night, the three of them put this plan into motion. They go and they break into the house where Michael lives. through an open window, and they've all got ski masks on, and they hide in closets, and they wait there for Michael to get home. An hours pass. Now, Michael, he doesn't own this house. He's actually just renting out a room there. I mean, he's rich, so I'm not sure why he's renting out a room in someone else's house, but whatever, this is his living arrangement. Now, the woman who owns the house is his roommate, and we'll just call her roommate. So Michael and roommate get home and they both go to bed. And suddenly, boom, the men wake Michael up at gunpoint, and then boom,

they do the same to roommate. Then they tie them up and they tape their mouth shut and they blindfold them and they throw them in the back of their van outside. Then they start driving towards the Mojave Desert. Now, along the way, they start demanding that Michael tell them where he hit his million dollars in cash. But here's the thing. Michael hasn't buried any cash out in the desert, Like, at all, that was just complete speculation on Hussein's part, and Hussein is very wrong about this. So Michael's like, I don't have any money buried out in the desert. But they don't believe him. So they start torturing him, hoping that he'll talk.

They beat him up. They taser him and some other really awful stuff. And of course, Michael doesn't comply because he can't. He doesn't have any money buried out in the desert. And about two hours pass. And finally, they reached the Mojave. And there, they drag Michael out of the van, and they demand that he show them where he buried the money. But Michael gives them the same answer.

He hasn't buried any money. And so, after a while, Hussein's dumbass is finally starting to realize that maybe Michael wasn't lying. Maybe the million dollars they came all this way for doesn't exist. And this makes all three kidnappers super pissed off. especially Hussein. He planned out this million dollar kidnapping for seven months and drove all the way here to get nothing? Oh, no, no. Someone is going to pay for that.

So these three guys decide to really torture Michael one last time. And they end up cutting off his junk. Then they leave and they take the junk with them. And Hussein is so mad that while they're driving along, he throws the dick out the window so that no one will ever be able to find it, and so doctors will never be able to reattach it. So now both Michael and roommate are there. They're left in the middle of the desert, and Michael is very injured.

But roommate actually isn't, because they chose not to hurt her for some reason. So after a while, roommate manages to untie herself, and she tries to free Michael, but she actually can't. So she starts walking toward the nearest road, hoping that someone will come along and find them. And eventually, that's what happens. She spots a county sheriff who's driving by. And after that, ultimately, Michael is taken to a nearby hospital for treatment, and luckily, he survives. Meanwhile, police, they start investigating this whole kidnapping. And so, police, they end up going to the house where Michael lives, and they start questioning all the neighbors,

asking them if they saw anyone or anything suspicious that day. And that's when one neighbor tells them, yeah, she saw some strange men in a Dodge Ram outside that house earlier that day. And something about it seemed weird, so she wrote down the license plate number of the truck that they were in. So police run this plate number, and it turns out that this Dodge Ram is registered to Kyle.

So they go and they find Kyle and bam, they arrest him. Here's his mugshot. And from here, Kyle goes to jail while police go and they search his place. And there, they find all kinds of evidence like things used in the kidnapping. But most importantly, they find a surgical glove in the Dodge Ram with Hussein's DNA on it. So now police want to talk to him. However, the problem is, Hussein knows that Kyle had recently been arrested and that he is likely next. So he decides the only way out of this is to find.

flee the country. And that's what he does. He abandons his wife and he flies from California all the way to Iran, where he was born. And Iran doesn't have an extradition treaty with the United States, so he can't be extradited for his crimes. Lucky him. And so eventually, the FBI and the U.S. Marshals get involved in this. And they end up approaching Hussein's wife to help them catch him. And so his wife, and I don't know, like, she must be mad that he just straight up abandoned her and went to Iran without her. But anyway, she agrees to help them out. So Hussein's wife starts communicating with him, and she's able to sweet talk him and convince him that the two of them should meet up in Spain. And Hussein, like, totally buys it. He's like, sure.

So he gets on a flight from Iran to Spain. But this flight has a scheduled layover in Prague. in the Czech Republic. And the FBI, they've been tracking his movements, and they see this layover coming from a mile away. So they're there waiting for him at the airport, and bam, they arrest him. Here's his mugshot.

And about a day later, bam, the third guy involved in the kidnapping, is also arrested. Here's his mugshot. And eventually, Hussein goes to trial, and he's found guilty, and he gets life in prison, while Kyle is also found guilty and also sentenced to life in prison, while the third kidnapper takes a plea deal

and he only gets sentenced to time served.