An Ohio resident has been taken into custody for reportedly concealing his participation in the Rwandan genocide nearly three decades ago.
Eric Tabaro Nshimiye, 52, residing in Uniontown, Ohio, was arrested by special agents from Homeland Security Investigations on Thursday, as per an announcement from the agency.
He is charged with falsifying, concealing, and covering up a material fact through deception, obstruction of justice, and perjury, according to HSI.
Nshimiye is accused of involvement in the killing of Tutsi individuals in Rwanda by using a nail-studded club to strike them on the head and then hacking them to death with a machete, states the HSI release. Specific incidents include the murder of a 14-year-old boy and aiding in the rape of Tutsi women.
CNN has reached out to the public defender representing Nshimiye for a statement.
The Rwandan genocide, which occurred in 1994, resulted in the deaths of approximately 800,000 people, primarily Tutsi ethnic minority members, who were granted higher social status by the Belgian colonial regime. Over the span of 100 days, soldiers, police, militia, and armed civilians from the Hutu ethnic majority carried out mass killings of Tutsis, encouraged by local officials and government-sponsored radio broadcasts urging civilians to attack, rape, rob, and murder their Tutsi neighbors.
“Nshimiye is accused of lying to hide his participation in one of the most significant human tragedies in history,” stated Michael J. Krol, an HSI agent, in the release.
Nshimiye’s charges also stem from statements he made during the 2019 trial in Boston of his former classmate and now-convicted Rwandan genocide perpetrator Jean Leonard Teganya. Authorities allege that Nshimiye lied during his testimony to conceal his own role in the genocide.
In 1994, both Nshimiye and Teganya were medical students and prominent student members of the National Revolutionary Movement for Development, the ruling Hutu-majority political party that advocated for the genocide, as well as the party’s violent youth wing, according to the release.
In 2017, Teganya, Nshimiye’s friend and former classmate, was charged with fraudulently seeking immigration benefits in the United States by concealing his involvement in the genocide. Nshimiye testified that neither he nor Teganya participated in the genocide. Teganya was convicted of immigration fraud and perjury in April 2019 and sentenced to eight years in prison.
Nshimiye fled Rwanda in the summer of 1994 and eventually arrived in Kenya, where he allegedly provided false information to U.S. immigration officials to gain entry into the country, according to the HSI release.
“Nshimiye relocated to Ohio and, over the following years, purportedly continued to provide deceptive information regarding his role in the Rwandan genocide to secure lawful permanent residency and ultimately U.S. citizenship,” the release states.
He is scheduled to appear in federal court in Boston at a later date, according to HSI. If convicted, he could face a maximum sentence of twenty years in prison and significant fines.
