{"id":1655,"date":"2020-09-02T20:43:51","date_gmt":"2020-09-02T20:43:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.iransos.com\/en\/?p=1655"},"modified":"2020-09-02T20:45:06","modified_gmt":"2020-09-02T20:45:06","slug":"death-sentence-for-champion-wrestler-based-on-false-evidence-torture-and-forced-false-confessions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.iransos.com\/en\/?p=1655","title":{"rendered":"Death Sentence for Champion Wrestler Based on False Evidence, Torture and Forced False Confessions"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Lawyer for Navid Afkari: Video Footage Proves He Did Not Commit Alleged Crime<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cThere is not one shred of evidence \u2026 they are looking for a neck for their rope\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

September 2, 2020\u2014The Iranian wrestling champion Navid Afkari has been sentenced to death for allegedly killing a security man in Shiraz, Fars Province at the time of the summer 2018 protests in the province\u2014despite evidence that he did not commit the alleged crime and that he was tortured during interrogation into giving a false \u201cconfession.\u201d\u201cThe Iranian authorities are increasingly using death sentences to terrorize the population into remaining silent and end any further participation in peaceful protests,\u201d said Hadi Ghaemi, executive director of the Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI).<\/p>\n

\u201cDeath sentences from a judicial system that ignores evidence, denies due process and tortures its detainees into false \u2018confessions\u2019 are nothing less than murder,\u201d Ghaemi added.<\/p>\n

Navid\u2019s death sentence has been upheld on appeal. Navid\u2019s two brothers, Vahid Afkari and Habib Afkari, were similarly convicted unjustly with Navid, and sentenced to 54 and 27 years in prison respectively. All three were also condemned to 74 lashes.<\/p>\n

CHRI calls for the immediate halt to any plans for the execution of Navid Afkari, and a thorough, unbiased judicial review of all three convictions.<\/p>\n

Lawyer: Camera Footage Proves Afkari Could Not Have Committed the Murder<\/strong><\/p>\n

A security camera recording, based on which the Iranian wrestling champion was given the death sentence, actually proves he could not have committed the murder he is accused of, Afkari\u2019s attorney Hassan Younesi said in an interview with CHRI on September 1, 2020.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is no visual evidence of the moment of the crime when [water company security employee Hassan Torkman] was killed, and the film presented in this case shows scenes an hour before the time of the murder,\u201d Younesi told CHRI.<\/p>\n

Navid, who has won several freestyle and Greco-Roman wrestling medals in Iranian and international tournaments, and his brother Vahid Afkari were arrested in Shiraz on September 17, 2018. Another brother, Habib Afkari, was arrested three months later.\u00a0 They were charged with \u201cwaging war against the state, corruption on earth and forming anti-revolutionary group\u201d for participating in protests that took place in the city at that time and for killing a security man on August 2, 2018.<\/p>\n

Death Sentence Upheld Despite Formal Complaints Filed for Torture<\/strong><\/p>\n

Navid\u2019s death sentence has been upheld by the Supreme Court, Younesi said, despite formal complaints filed against interrogators for committing torture.<\/p>\n

Navid filed a\u00a0complaint<\/a>\u00a0with the judiciary on September 13, 2019, detailing how he was forced to give false confessions while being subjected to \u201cthe most severe physical and psychological torture\u201d during nearly 50 days in police detention.<\/p>\n

In an\u00a0audio file<\/a>\u00a0shared on August 30, 2020, Navid is heard saying that the Medical Examiner\u2019s Office in Shiraz carried out an examination of his injuries that were caused under torture.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe evidence is there if the court wants to investigate [the acts of torture] \u2026 There is not one shred of evidence in this damned case that shows I\u2019m guilty. But they don\u2019t want to listen to us. I realized they are looking for a neck for their rope,\u201d Navid said.<\/p>\n

The official news agency of Iran\u2019s judiciary, Mizan, claimed in a\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0on August 31, 2020, that \u201ca review of the closed-circuit camera footage from a street where the killer was pursued led to the arrest of Navid Afkari as a suspect in this case.\u201d<\/p>\n

All Three Brothers Severely Tortured<\/strong><\/p>\n

In a\u00a0video message<\/a>\u00a0on August 30, 2020, the mother of the Afkari brothers, Behieh Namjoo, said: \u201cVahid has been under so much physical and psychological torture that he attempted suicide three times\u2026 to force him to implicate Navid.\u201d<\/p>\n

She added: \u201cThey held an unjust and false trial where my children were not able to defend themselves and sentenced them without evidence of any crime\u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cI call upon the people of the world and the people of Iran and anyone who can hear me to help [fight] the unjust sentences against my sons.\u201d<\/p>\n

In another\u00a0audio file<\/a>\u00a0shared on August 31, 2020, Navid\u2019s brother Vahid also talks about being tortured and threatened during interrogation:<\/p>\n

\u201cI was in a coma in the Namazi Hospital (in Shiraz) for three days and no one could hear me. Then they tortured me and put a plastic bag over my head. They beat me with chains for hours and struck the bottom of my feet with a baton. They would pee on the floor and force me to walk on it. They threatened to arrest my mother and sister.\u201d<\/p>\n

Vahid continued: \u201cFrom the very beginning the victims\u2019 parents denied knowing us. I told the judge to present a witness. If there\u2019s proof of my presence on my phone or on a camera footage, show it. If a murder weapon has been uncovered at our home, show it\u2026 when I said these things the judge only laughed and made fun of us.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cThere is not one shred of evidence \u2026 they are looking for a neck for their rope\u201d September 2, 2020\u2014The Iranian wrestling champion Navid Afkari has been sentenced to death<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[375,519],"class_list":["post-1655","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-human-rights","tag-iran-protests","tag-navid-afkari"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iransos.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1655","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iransos.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iransos.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iransos.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iransos.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1655"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.iransos.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1655\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1657,"href":"https:\/\/www.iransos.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1655\/revisions\/1657"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iransos.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iransos.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iransos.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}