A man who was accused of faking his own death in 2020 and fleeing to Europe to evade rape charges in the U.S. has died after he was taken to a hospital from a Utah prison, authorities said Friday.
Nicholas Rossi was serving at least 10 years in prison for two sexual assault cases that went to trial in Utah in 2025, following a yearslong global saga to find him and then extradite him from Scotland. A judge had described him as a “serial abuser of women.”
Rossi, 38, died Thursday night from “complications of an existing medical condition after choosing to discontinue medical treatment,” said Richard Piatt, a spokesperson at the Utah Department of Corrections.
His victims and his family were notified, Piatt said.
Piatt said he couldn’t disclose details about Rossi’s health problems. But during court appearances, he had appeared in a wheelchair and used oxygen.
“Mr. Rossi was a sexual predator who tried to escape accountability,” Salt Lake County prosecutor Sim Gill said. “The survivors of his heinous acts have the consolation that he died in prison with the knowledge of the crimes he committed.”
Rossi, also known as Nicholas Alahverdian, was extradited to Utah from Scotland in 2024. Authorities had been searching for him when he was identified in 2018 through a decade-old DNA rape kit.
