Interpreter who served with US forces in Afghanistan, fled Taliban takeover, shot dead driving Lyft in DC

A father of four who had served as an interpreter alongside US special forces in Afghanistan and escaped after the Taliban takeover was gunned down while working as a Lyft driver in Washington, DC, early Monday morning.

Nasrat Ahmad Yar, 31, decided to work a few extra hours for the ride-share service, despite his wife’s protests that night, telling her they needed money for the rent, a friend told WUSA9.

He was shot and killed in his car a short time later after they spoke.

Shortly after midnight on Monday, DC Metro police found Ahmad Yar with a single gunshot wound close to his car on 11th Street Northeast. He was taken to a local hospital where he was pronounced dead, police told the station.

“We need justice for Nasrat,” his cousin Samim Amiri said.

“That’s all the family wants.”

Ahmad Yar had been working 12-hour shifts for Lyft as the sole provider for his wife and four children, who range in age from 15 months to 13, after fleeing Afghanistan in August 2021 when the United States military evacuated and the Taliban seized power. He also sent money back to his family remaining overseas.

He had worked as a beloved and reliable interpreter with US special forces deployed in Afghanistan for nearly a decade.

“He was so happy he got a new car because he could take care of his family,” his best friend Rahim Amini told WSUA9.

“His wife asked him to stay home but he said, ‘I have to pay rent. I don’t have that much money. I have to work.’”

Yar and his family had first settled in Philadelphia, but, after being robbed at gunpoint, moved to Alexandria, Virginia, where he thought he and his family would be safer, less than a year ago, his friend Jeramie Malone said.

Malone helped the Afghan national and his family relocate to the US through a volunteer organization from a refugee site in Abu Dhabi, he told WUSA9. 

Since he had worked as an interpreter for the US government before the Afghan government collapsed, he was likely a target for the Taliban.

“He was most certainly a marked man if he stayed,” retired Lt. Col. Matthew Butler, who worked closely with Ahmad Yar in Afghanistan, told WUSA9.

“He served this country a great deal more than I did. I did 42 months in combat but that was nowhere near what he had.”

Butler said he and Ahmad Yar worked at Camp Vance of the Bagram Airfield during two of his deployments, where he started helping the interpreter work on his immigration to the US before the Taliban took over.

“You just don’t have words to describe how you feel about someone who had given so much to his country, not as a citizen, but then comes here and experiences some of the worst behavior our country has to offer,” Butler said. 

“The irony is really thick here,” he added.

The shooting was captured on security camera footage, obtained by WUSA9.

In the clip, a single gunshot can be heard and then four young men are seen running down an alleyway.

“You killed him! He was about to get out,” one of them says. Another responds, “He was reaching, bro.” 

Lyft confirmed that Ahmad Yar was one of their drivers and had reached out to his family.

“Our hearts are with Mr. Nasrat’s loved ones as they confront this unspeakable tragedy,” the company said in a statement.