A 44-year-old man directed a daring Orange County jail escape seven years ago, holding a cab driver against his will for about a week as the fugitives remained at large in a stolen van, a prosecutor told jurors Monday The defendant’s attorney admitted his client got away but insisted the driver had willingly gone with him.
Hossein Nayeri, 44, is charged with escaping custody, stealing a car and kidnapping for stealing a car, all felonies. A charge of kidnapping for robbery was dismissed, according to court documents.
Co-defendant Bac Tien Duong, 50, was sentenced to 20 years in prison in July. Duong, who was in custody for attempted murder at the time of the escape, also solved that case when he was convicted.
Duong was convicted of escaping in April 2021. He was acquitted of the crime of kidnapping for robbery but convicted on the lesser charge of simple kidnapping. A mistrial was declared when the jury failed to reach a verdict on the theft car.
Co-defendant Jonathan Tieu, 27, is awaiting trial.
The trio’s daring escape from the Santa Ana Central Men’s Prison on January 22, 2016 was made possible when they obtained cutting tools to saw through metal gates and then used contraband cellphones to communicate with co-conspirators outside the prison. They were free for a week before authorities caught up with Nayeri.
“This escape wasn’t just jumping out of a van,” Assistant District Attorney David McMurrin said.
They cut through air vents” while using plumbing tunnels and “makeshift pulleys” and ropes to “come down from the third floor roof,” the prosecutor added.
“The defendant planned this for 7 1/2 months,” McMurrin said. “And everything had to be perfect, but they couldn’t do it alone.”
Duong contacted an old friend for help in escaping. Loc Ba Nguyen, Duong’s friend, was the first witness in Nayeri’s trial. He said he suffered a stroke that affected his memory, so McMurrin had to show him parts of his earlier testimony to refresh his memory.
Nguyen said he met Duong about 20 years ago when he hired him to help out at a furniture store he opened and they stayed in touch over the years, occasionally meeting up for lunch. He said he later heard that Duong was in prison and went to see him.
During the January 9, 2016 visit, Duong pulled a piece of paper from under his shirt and pressed it against the plexiglass between them. The note, written in English, included a list of items Duong said he needed and a map of the prison district, Nguyen said.
Nguyen “guessed” someone else had written the note because Duong had trouble speaking and writing English.
The items included a “cell phone, utility knife, rope, clothes, shoes” and a map of 10th Street and Olive Street near the jail, Nguyen said.
“All he told me was to look at (the note) and just leave the stuff there,” Nguyen said.
A few days later, Duong Nguyen called from prison.
“He mentioned did I get the items?” Nguyen said. “I told him I bought the stuff. At one point he gave me instructions to put things in a bag and attach the bag to a hanging rope.”
Nguyen did as he was told and “turned and left,” he said. Nguyen said he helped Duong “out of fear” because he was “contacted by another” man who “made sure what Mr. Duong told me” to do.
Nguyen understood that he was supporting a prison break.
Duong told Nguyen he “met someone who had an escape plan.” This man went by the name “Adam,” a nickname for the defendant, Nguyen said.
Nguyen then received another call – this time from the smuggled cell phone – and Adam requested another cell phone, Nguyen testified.
“I remember buying another used phone,” he testified.
He was also told to bring more rope and a hoodie, Nguyen said.
Nguyen returned with another bag containing a phone, which this time had a charger because the other phone didn’t have a charger, Nguyen said.
Nguyen made a trip to Palm Springs and received another call from one of the smuggling phones, and this time he was asked about an old white work van that he no longer had, Nguyen said.
“He asked me how to transfer money from Iran or Iraq to America,” Nguyen said.
Nguyen recommended calling a friend of his from Lebanon, he said.
Nguyen, who was living in Costa Mesa at the time, drove to the jail early on the day of the escape to pick her up, but when no one showed up after a while, he returned home, he said.
Duong called again around 4 or 4:30 and “He said please come back to that corner,” Nguyen said.
“I said no, I can’t come back,” he testified. “But he was kind of begging and crying, so I went back.”
Nguyen parked his pickup truck in a cul-de-sac around 4:30 a.m. and “waited like 40 minutes, 30 minutes,” he said.
Then the three “very lucky” trios got in the pickup and it drove off, he said.
Duong told him to drive through the “very, very foggy” night to Westminster, “where his aunt lived,” Nguyen said.
Duong led Nguyen to the home of Tung Nguyen, who in November 2018 pleaded guilty to being an accomplice and was sentenced to 40 hours of community service. Tung Nguyen is not related to Loc Nguyen.
When they arrived, the three removed their orange prison overalls and threw the uniforms in a trash can on the street since it was trash day, Nguyen said.
“I told (Duong) I was going and he told me to wait,” Nguyen said.
Nguyen waited with Nayeri and Tieu for about half an hour, and Duong “came back with a few bottles of beer. I wasn’t drinking, so I said no, I don’t need to,” Nguyen said. “He had some cash with him, so I said, ‘Okay, I’m going.’ ”
McMurrin told jurors in his opening statement that the trio “needed more help, and that’s where Long Ma comes in.”
Ma was an unlicensed taxi driver whom the trio hired to transport them, prosecutors said. Ma drove them to a Walmart in Santa Ana and they asked him to drive them to Rosemead for $100, McMurrin said.
Ma was told the three wanted to “borrow” Mas’ car, and when he refused, they “pulled a gun” on him and demanded his phone, wallet and keys, McMurrin said.
“He’s not the driver anymore,” McMurrin said. “He wasn’t free to go.”
The fugitives needed Ma to register at motels and help them retrieve cash from Nayeri’s mother, McMurrin said.
They later responded to an ad for a GMC van for sale in Los Angeles and stole the man’s vehicle while Duong was test driving it, McMurrin said. They drove on with the two vehicles, the prosecutor said.
When the three arrived in San Jose, an argument broke out between Duong and Nayeri over what to do with Ma, McMurrin said. Duong wanted to protect Ma, so he got into a fight with Nayeri, McMurrin said.
Duong and Ma drove back to Orange County, where Duong surrendered Jan. 28, McMurrin said.
Nayeri and Tieu were arrested in San Francisco the next day when a passerby who recognized them stopped passing officers, McMurrin said. Tieu was caught in the van they were living in and Nayeri tried to run away but was tracked down. Police found $601 in cash in the van with multiple phones, McMurrin said.
Nayeri’s attorney, Michael Goldfeder, said: “We wouldn’t be here today if it were just about the escape charge. He was open to taking responsibility for it.”
Nayeri is only questioning the kidnapping and auto theft charges, he said.
Nayeri was not with Duong when the van was stolen, Goldfeder said.
“Mr. Duong is the mastermind behind the prison,” Goldfeder said.
He said it was unclear whether Duong and Ma knew each other before the escape.
“Bac Duong and Mr. Ma made a financial deal” to help escape, Goldfeder said.
Ma should be paid $10,000 for transportation, Goldfeder said.
“Mr. Ma willingly participates in moving these people around,” the defense attorney said.
Ma was paid about $500 for trips to Walmart and the Target store in Rosemead, Goldfeder said.
Goldfeder also pointed out how Ma, Tieu, and Nayeri went to the Santa Cruz pier to flee when he showed jurors a photo of Tieu with his arm around Ma’s shoulder.
“There’s a lot more where that came from,” Goldfeder said of the evidence.
Nayeri was in custody at the time awaiting trial for sexually mutilating a marijuana dispensary owner as part of a kidnapping and extortion plot. Nayeri was convicted in that case in August 2019 and sentenced to life in prison without parole in October 2020.
Nguyen pleaded guilty in June 2017 and was sentenced to a year in prison but was serving his time under house arrest because he said he suffered a stroke on the day of sentencing.
