Los Angeles (CNN) -- Reza Taghavi, an Iranian-American detained for more than two years in Iran, returned to the United States Thursday evening. 

The retired businessman from Orange County, California, was released Saturday. He had been held in Iran's notorious Evin prison since May 2008 on suspicion of supporting an anti-regime group. 

Taghavi's lawyer, Pierre-Richard Prosper, had been negotiating Taghavi's release since September 2009. 

Saturday's release was the product of three trips to Iran, meetings with Iranian officials in New York and Europe, and close to 300 e-mails with Iranian officials, he said. 

Taghavi, 71, traveled frequently to Iran to visit family and friends without incident, according to Prosper. 

In April 2008, Taghavi went to Tehran with his wife. Before he left, he was asked by an acquaintance in Los Angeles named Imran Afar to take $200 for a friend in Tehran "who was down on his luck," Prosper said. 

Los Angeles has a large Persian community. 

Taghavi did not know the individual to whom he was asked to deliver the money, Prosper said. He handed it over and two weeks later was detained by Iranian authorities, after the recipient of the money was arrested on charges of association with an anti-regime group called Tondar. 

Prosper said Afar provided him with information he shared with the Iranian government that proved that Taghavi was not part of Tondar, which seeks to restore the monarchy in Iran. The group claimed responsibility for the April 12, 2008, bombing of the Hosseynieh Seyed al-Shohada mosque in the city of Shiraz. 
how much money was he asked to take to teran
200 