Izmir Koch

By Aiden Pink September 10, 2019

An Ohio man who was convicted of an anti-Semitic hate crime has gone missing before he was supposed to report to prison.

The FBI issued an arrest warrant for Izmir Koch and is offering a $5,000 reward for information leading to his detention, Fox 19 in Cincinnati reported Monday.

Koch was convicted in December 2018 after an incident earlier that year when he exited a restaurant and began shouting in Russian to ask if anyone was Jewish. When a nearby man pointed to himself, Koch allegedly attacked him while yelling, “I want to kill all the Jews.”

Forwarding the News

Thoughtful, balanced reporting from the Forward and around the web, bringing you updated news and analysis each day.

Terms(Required)

I agree to the Forward's Terms of Service and Privacy Policy

Email(Required)

The victim, who reportedly had a broken bone in his face and bruised ribs, was not actually Jewish, though he had friends and family who are.

Koch was also convicted of lying to the FBI because he initially denied his role in the attack to investigators. He was sentenced to 30 months in prison in July.

Koch was supposed to report to Federal Correctional Institute Gilmer in West Virginia on August 16, but never showed up, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Ohio. He now faces an additional five years in prison for failing to appear.

Aiden Pink is the deputy news editor of the Forward. Contact him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter @aidenpink

The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.

Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. We’re near the end of our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we have a very ambitious goal of $127,000 by April 21.

This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a Passover gift today!

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Make a Passover Gift Today!

$90 $180

$360

Other amount