A 37-year-old man accused of faking his own death and fleeing across the Atlantic to evade rape charges in Utah admitted for the first time this week to assuming a false identity and moving to Europe, but claimed he’d only done so because of “credible” death threats he and his family had received.
Asked in a Provo, Utah, courtroom on Wednesday to reveal the source of those threats, Nicholas Rossi refused. “I don’t want to give a mouse cheese,” he said.
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Bewildered, a prosecutor asked after a moment, “What would giving their names... How would that give a mouse cheese?” according to The Providence Journal.
“Meaning that would stoke the fire they’ve had to continue with their actions against me,” Rossi said. “That’s why I haven’t gone public.”
Rossi was arrested in Glasgow, Scotland, in December 2021, three years after he was identified as the suspect in the rape of a 21-year-old woman in Utah in 2008. He has also been charged with another rape that same year, with the 26-year-old alleged victim identified as a former girlfriend of his.
He was extradited back to the U.S. earlier this year after his case wound its way through the Scottish courts, a process that was prolonged by Rossi’s continued insistence that he was not Rossi at all but rather a mild-mannered Irish academic named Arthur Knight.
While maintaining the ruse, Rossi insisted on speaking in a phony English accent, saying archly in 2022, “As sure as the queen is about to have a Platinum Jubilee, I will prove that I am Arthur Knight.”
He continued doing this even after his deportation, referring to the judge overseeing his hearings in Provo as “m’lady,” according to The Times of London.
Rossi finally dropped the Received Pronunciation on Wednesday, speaking at his bail hearing in an American accent. He explained that he’d left the country after receiving “two credible threats” related to his work in Rhode Island as a child welfare reform advocate.
“They threatened to ruin my life, destroy my life, made frequent threats to kill me, made frequent threats to kill my family,” he said.
After Rossi made his “mouse” remark, the judge temporarily closed the courtroom to allow him to identify the source of the threats.
At the same hearing, Rossi also acknowledged for the first time that he’d been “born with the name Nicholas Alahverdian,” explaining he’d changed his surname to Rossi, his stepfather’s, in 1996.
It was “Nicholas Alahverdian” who supposedly died in Rhode Island in February 2020, according to contemporaneous news reports. Authorities previously identified Alahverdian as another one of Rossi’s aliases.
Wednesday’s proceedings ended with the judge denying Rossi bail after prosecutors pointed to his many deceptions, saying he was “highly” likely to skip town. His lawyers argued unsuccessfully that Rossi was not a flight risk, citing his physical condition.
The 37-year-old depends on a wheelchair and an oxygen tank as a result of being incapacitated by COVID-19 in 2021. He was hospitalized after falling sick with the virus, with hospital staff recognizing him as Rossi based on photos of his tattoos circulated by Interpol.
