The Indictment for the Abuses at Kahrizak Prison

EA WorldView - A source forwards an English translation, posted on the opposition website Rah-e-Sabz on 5 January, of the Tehran military prosecutor's 27-page indictment against 12 alleged perpretrators of the post-election abuses and killings at the Kahrizak detention centre. The text is introduced with a lengthy analysis:

The full text of the indictment against the accused in the Kahrizak case, signed by the Deputy Military Prosecutor of Tehran, Abbas Parsapour, has recently come to the possession of the Jaras (the Rah-e Sabz (Green Path) Movement). The document, file number 88/4703 and dated 25 Azar 1388 (16 December 2009), is organized in 27 pages. Twelve names appear in this indictment as the accused.

Eleven of the 12 accused who are charged with the crimes in this case are members of the armed forces and one person is a civilian, a hooligan who worked with the law enforcement forces. The highest ranking accused in this case is the commander of the Law Enforcement Forces in the Greater Tehran area (Brigadier General Azizollah Rajabzadeh).

The names of several high-ranking officials of the judiciary also appear in the indictment, but apparently these individuals who issued the orders (making the detainees subject to the conditions in the Kahrizak Detention Center) have not been officially acknowledged by this document as the accused. This indictment is only concerned with the doers of the crimes (individuals who have been physically responsible for the crimes) and has not been organizationally permitted to bring charges against the persons who have given the orders.

Another important point in relation to this indictment is that it is solely based on the complaints filed by the torture victims themselves and is not based on charges made by the prosecutor or the country's prosecutor general. The meaningful absence of the prosecutorial charge in this indictment means that the system has no complaints against the accused in this case, because the perpetrators acted on their duties and not as rogue elements in this case. Other documents have also come to the possession of Jaras (the Rah-e Sabz --- Green Path --- Movement) that will gradually be published.

Jaras calls on all the jurists and attorneys at law to review and assess the Kahrizak documents from a legal point of view. Kahrizak is the mirror that reflects adjudication and justice in the Islamic Republic (of Iran).

From the text of the indictment:

At the time of commitment to the Kahrizak Detention Center, all the accused must remove their clothing and become nude in full view of the others present and at times are forced to remain in that condition (remain unclothed) for a long period of time. Their undergarments are taken away from them and thrown away. Then, they are forced to wear their outer garments inside out ....The thugs and hooligans in the detention center would also walk around in a nude or semi-nude state among the detainees who were brought to the Kahrizak Detention Center as a result of the post-election incidents and would harass and assault them....

By the order of the higher-ups, the detention center officers buried one of the detainees in a hole in the ground up to his waist and battered him for 10 hours without giving him any food or water....Even though it was summer time and the weather was unbearably hot, they divided the detainees who were sent to the Kahrizak Detention Center after the election into four groups and threw them into the cages (sic) that were specially made to contain thugs and hooligans....

According to the available documents, enough space did not even exist to allow the detainees to sit down, and most of the detainees had to spend all night standing up....There were only two toilets available for all the persons kept in the detention camp. One of them was not working, and the other did not have a door. The detainees had to go everywhere barefooted, including the bathroom ... All the detainees developed infections in the eyes ... Constant assaults and beatings with the fists, kicks, beatings with PVC pipes, and other violent physical assaults on the detainees and the summer heat had caused many of the detainees who were arrested during the recent (i.e., post-election) incidents to lose consciousness and pass out ...

Now, 16 months after the closing of the Kahrizak Detention Center and several months after the conclusion of the report by the special committee of the Islamic Consultative Assembly (Majlis) that looked into the incidents inside that detention center --- which had caused several detainees who had been arrested in the post-election protests to lose their lives --- the indictments for the individuals who have been charged in connection with those incidents in this national dossier have been made public.

Sometime ago, the deputy head of the Judicial Organization of the Armed Forces in charge of legal affairs, talking about the latest legal status of the Kahrizak Detention Center case, has indicated: "From our perspective, the judicial review of the Kahrizak case has come to a conclusion and like the other cases it has been referred to the Supreme Court for appeal."

It must be noted that, during the incidents that followed the 1388 (2009) presidential election in Iran, a large number of the detainees who were arrested during the protests on 18 Tir (9 July 2009) were sent to the terrifying Kahrizak Detention Center (situated in the south of Tehran) by the order of security officials and the officials of the judiciary such as Judge Sa'id Mortazavi, then the Prosecutor General of Tehran. There, the detainees were assaulted and tortured, and some of them lost their lives as a result of those tortures. The relevant authorities, including the then Prosecutor General of Tehran (Sa'id Mortazavi), claimed that those deaths were caused by "meningitis and illness", but those claims were strongly denied by the coroner's office.

The Judicial Organization of the Armed Forces also issued a statement on the 9th of Tir of this year (30 June 2010) holding two law enforcement agents responsible for the killing of three detainees (Amir Javadifar, Mohsen Ruholamini, and Mohammad Kamrani). The statement also indicated that the two officers who were found guilty were condemned to death (qesas), the payment of blood money (diyeh), imprisonment, temporary suspension from service, and flogging. At the same time, the other defendants in the case, nine law enforcement officers and a civilian, were also condemned to sentences such as imprisonment, the payment of blood money (diyeh), temporary discharge from service, and flogging for various charges. However, immediately after that news was announced, a member of the Majles investigative committee that was set up to look into the events that followed the (2009) presidential election in Iran issued a statement condemning the announcement by the Judicial Organization of the Armed Forces. According to this member of the Majlis, revealing the names and information about the victims and the accused in the Kahrizak case at that juncture was in violation of the law.

In a related development, on Sunday 28 Azar 1389 (19 December 2010), after several months and many ups and downs, finally the news sources were able to obtain the text of the 27-page indictment of some of the accused in this national case and make it available to the media.

According to a report by Jaras, this indictment by the Judicial Organization of the Armed Forces, which is dated 25 Azar 1388 (16 December 2009), provides a description of the inhumane and tragic conditions at the Kahrizak Detention Center and depicts some of the conduct of the 12 accused parties in the case--11 of whom are law enforcements officers--based on their own admissions. The indictment also notes that violence, beatings, and physical assaults against the detainees have apparently been a "routine practice" in that detention center.

This indictment brings charges against the accused based on their own "confessions and admissions". The charges include "murder", "participating in the commission of murder" through assaulting the detainees, torturing and abusing the detainees, depriving the prisoners of their basic rights, filing false reports, and threatening the complainants in this case.

The indictment also identifies the accused and makes mention of their ranks: Brigadier General Azizollah Rajabzadeh, Colonel Faraj Kamijani, Master Sergeant (ostovar) Mohammad Khamisabadi, Master Sergeant (ostovar) Ebrahim Mohammadian, Colonel Ravanbakhsh Fallah, Colonel Mohammad Amerian, 3rd Lieutenant Seyyed Kazem Ganjbakhsh, Master Sergeant (ostovar) Akbar Rahsepar, Master Sergeant 2nd Class (ostovar dovom) Hamid Zandi, Master Sergeant 2nd Class (ostovar dovom) Majid Varva'i, and Sergeant 2nd Class (gorohban dovom) Mehdi Hoseynifar. Besides these 11 accused who are members of the armed forces, references are also made to a 12th accused person, a civilian by the name of Mohammad Reza Karami. He is a known hooligan with a long record of prior offenses who was appointed by the authorities at the Kahrizak Detention Center as "the person responsible for the section" and had played an active part in the abuse, assault, and murder of the detainees.

In the fourth section of the indictment, the document highlights assaults and abuses that have led to the deaths of the victims according to the reports from the coroner's office and writes, "The late Mohsen Ruholamini, 25 years of age, died of physical and psychological stresses caused by numerous physical blows and poor keeping conditions. The cause of death was systematic inflammatory reactions of the vital organs and organ failures ... The late Amir Javadifar, 25 years old, according to a report by a group of medical experts at the office of the coroner, died as a result of the blows by a hard object (to his head and body). He died on the way from the Kahrizak (Detention Center) to the Evin (Prison) ... The late Mohammad Kamrani, 18 years of age, died after having been transferred to the hospital as a result of the complications associated with kidney and organ failures as a result of (repeated) blows by a hard object."

In another part of this indictment, references are made to Dr Ramin Pourandarjani, the physician at the Kahrizak Detention Center who himself died under mysterious circumstances sometime later. According to the confessions made by the accused, Dr Pourandarjani and his superior both refused to sign the false report that indicated that the prisoners died of meningitis. Finally, the report in question was signed by the accused themselves and sent to the officials of the judiciary.

Another important point in this section of the indictment is the reference to the role that (Judge) Sa'id Mortazavi, then Prosecutor General of Tehran, played in this affair and the orders that he issued. "After Dr Ramin Pourandarjani and his superior (Dr Farahmandpour) refused to sign the false report about the cause of the deaths of the detainees, a letter was dictated and prepared by Sa'id Mortazavi and was given to the (Kahrizak) officials in which Mortazavi had indicated that, due to certain expediencies, the officials in question were to file a report with the judicial authorities that cited meningitis as the cause of detainees' deaths. The commander of the law enforcement (forces) in the Greater Tehran (Brigadier General Azizollah Rajabzadeh) also had issued orders for cooperation in this regard ..."

The officials in question had indicated in their false report that, "according to the Mehr Hospital, the Shohada Hospital in Tajrish, and the Loghman Hospital, all the three accused had died as a result of meningitis and that they have not been assaulted by any means or in any way while they were in the (Kahrizak) Detention Center ..."

References also have been made (in the indictment) to the role that (Hassa) Hadad, Deputy Tehran Prosecutor for Security Affairs, played in these incidents and the orders that he had issued for the transfer of the detainees who were arrested on 18 Tir (9 July) to the Kahrizak Detention Center.

Another noteworthy point in this indictment is that, contrary to what had been indicated earlier, tens of individuals who were arrested during the demonstrations on the 18th of Tir 1388 (9 July 2009) were sent to the Kahrizak Detention Center. According to the document, those detainees were sent to the section designed for thugs and hooligans and there they were made subject to special assaults and abuses. Many of these former detainees who were arrested during the post-election protests and were sent to the Kahrizak Detention Center carried the effects and injuries of those assaults for months after they were freed and until the time that this indictment was being prepared.

The indictment sheds some light on the tortures and the role that the perpetrators and those who had issued the orders had played in this affair.