Sayed Bozorg Mahmoody
 Sayed Bozorg Mahmoody news interview
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Sayed Bozorg "Moody" Mahmoody, PhD (c. 1939 - August 23, 2009) was an Iranian anesthesiologist known for taking his American wife Betty and their daughter Mahtob to his native country of Iran and allegedly keeping them hostage there for a period of eighteen months during the mid-1980s.
Mahmoody was born to a prominent family in Shustar, Iran and was educated in London and the United States.
Mahmoody left Iran at the age of 18 to study English in London. He then moved to the United States, where he became a university math professor and an engineer. He worked for NASA during the 1960s, then went to medical school and became an anaesthesiologist.
Mahmoody met Betty in 1974. They dated for three years and Betty referred to him by the nickname, "Moody". After officially becoming a licensed anesthesiologist based in the U.S., Moody married Betty in Houston in 1977. Moody claimed Betty proposed to him, converted to Islam and took a lively interest in Persian culture. They resided in Texas. "He was so affectionate and considerate. He would send me flowers, books, music boxes, with beautiful inscriptions and there didn`t even have to be a reason," Betty said of her ex-husband.
Their daughter, Mahtob, which means "Moonlight" in Persian, was born in 1979. It was Moody who named her that, after he looked at a full moon. The Mahmoodys later moved to Michigan.
With some assistance from one of his nephews, Moody was alleged to have taken his wife and daughter to his native nation on August 4, 1984. Moody was able to convince his wife that their daughter deserved a visit "on holiday" for two weeks in Iran. As their stay in Iran for the period he is claimed to have promised ended, Moody then told her they would not be returning to the U.S.
Betty once quoted her husband in her 1987 book, Not Without My Daughter, telling her, "If you try to leave this house again, I will kill you!"
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