Iran Hangs Juvenile Offender Shayan Saeedpour
Published by Ali on April 23, 2020
International Liberty Association: A juvenile offender was executed by Iranian authorities in Saqqez prison, in Kurdestan province, western Iran. Shayan Saeedpour was arrested at 17, after surrendering himself at a police station for the murder during a fight in August 2015. In October 2018 branch One of Kurdistan’s criminal court sentenced him to death for first-degree murder and to 80 lashes for drinking alcohol.
There are evidences indicating that Shayan Saeedpour was under the care of a psychiatrist before the murder.
On 27 March, Saeedpour had managed to escape along with tens of other inmates during a protest by inmates against prison conditions amid the coronavirus outbreak.
He was arrested a few days later and executed despite Iran being bound by an absolute international legal ban on juvenile executions.
Saeedpour’s family was told to come to Sanandaj Prison, where he was taken after being re-arrested for a last visit with their son on Monday.
There were unrest in several prisons, and a mass escape from Saqqez Prison and several other prisons across the country.
On 11 April Iranian authorities hanged Mostafa Salimi, a Kurdish prisoner in the same prison. He had also managed to escape the prison and fled to Iraq’s autonomous Kurdish region.
According to Human Rights organisations, under pressure from Iran, Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) extradited Salimi to Iran.
Elsewhere, a juvenile offender, Daniel Zeinolabedini, died in Mahabad Prison after he was badly beaten and tortured by security officers.
He was put in solitary confinement and beaten by security officers in Mahabad prison in Urmia in West Azerbaijan Province after a riot erupted on 28 March.
ILA: Zeinlabedini had been arrested two years ago for murder and put on death row, although he was 17 and a juvenile when he committed murder.
