Iran: Woman Scheduled To Be Hanged In Few Hours

The woman who is identified as Somayeh Shahbazi Jahroei (33) is sentenced to death for murdering a man six years ago. According to one of Somayeh's relatives, "the murder victim had tried to rape Somayeh. When the man died, Somayeh was scared and took the body out of the town and set it on fire".

The relative continued:" The murder victim's family had at first asked for 10 billion Toman (about one million dollars) blood money. However, they later agreed on 5 billion Toman and they were going to give us a few month's deadline. However, the Head of the prison called today and informed us that Somayeh will be hanged at 07:30 tomorrow morning."

In qisas cases, the plaintiff has the possibility to forgive or demand diya (blood money). In many cases, the victim's family are encouraged to put the rope is around the prisoner's neck and even carry out the actual execution by pulling off the chair the prisoner is standing on.

According to the Iranian Islamic Penal Code (IPC) murder is punishable by qisas which means “retribution in kind” or retaliation. In this way, the State effectively puts the responsibility of the death sentence for murder on the shoulders of the victim’s family. 

Out of the 110 people who were executed in the first half of 2019, 83 were sentenced to qisas (retribution in-kind) for murder.

There is a lack of a classification of murder by degree in Iran which results in issuing a death sentence for any kind of murder regardless of intensity and intent.