Protester Alireza Sepahi at Imminent Risk of Execution in Iran

According to activist Mehdi Mahmoudian, Alireza Sepahi Badjani has been transferred from the general ward of Isfahan (Dastgerd) Central Prison to solitary confinement, where death row prisoners are typically transferred in preparation for their executions. 

The 25-year-old protester was arrested at his home along with his mother on 10 January. He is one of at least a dozen defendants in the case who were accused of participating in the murder of four policemen in Isfahan’s Alikhani Square on 8 January. 

Warning of his imminent execution, Mehdi Mahmoudian wrote: “To understand what Alireza is facing today, one must return to the beginning of this case. To the days when his mother was tortured before his eyes, and Alireza himself and Abolfazl Sepahi were beaten and tortured in front of their family. The violence that began in the earliest days of detention later continued through coerced confessions and numerous due process violations throughout the judicial proceedings. This is the same case in which several victims spoke in court of torture, assault and explicit threats of rape used to extract forced confessions against one another, upon which a major portion of the case and the issued sentences were based.”

On 31 July, IHRNGO reported that he was scheduled to be publicly hanged on 28 July which was halted after he suffered a heart attack, warning that Alireza and five of his co-defendants were at grave risk of execution. On 2 September, Alireza’s lawyer, Shahrzad Shahbazi reported that Branch 39 of the Supreme Court had accepted his appeal and referred the case to a court of equal standing for retrial. However, Branch Two of the Isfahan Revolutionary Court had dismissed the application without a hearing. At the time, she stated that she would be filing an appeal on 5 September. The status of the appeal is not clear. 

“Now, Alireza has been taken to solitary confinement once again. A man whose mother was tortured before his eyes, who was beaten alongside his relatives in front of their family, whose case involves serious allegations of torture and forced confessions and whose sentence was once quashed by the Supreme Court for a retrial now stands steps away from execution,” Mehdi Mahmoudian wrote. 

Five defendants in the case have been executed so far, with two of them carried out publicly. Erfan Esfandiari and Gol Mohammad Mohammadi were executed at the prison on 19 July,  Alireza’s cousin, Abolfazl Sepahi and Amirhossein Safari were publicly hanged in Alikhani Square, the scene of the alleged offences, on 28 July, and Ghaem Hosseini was executed at the prison on 20 August.