Man sentenced to blinding and disfigurement in retribution

“The Supreme Court issued a rare final ruling, sentencing the suspect in an acid throwing case to eye gauging and earlobe cutting,” the Iran Daily reported yesterday. Six years ago, the young man had mistakenly thrown acid on a tailor shop employee’s face.

According to the Iran Daily, on 23 June 2005, Hamid, 26, threw acid on a young man by the name of Davood in an eastern Tehran neighborhood. After hearing the heart-wrenching screams of the 22-year-old victim, the neighbors immediately transferred him to the hospital, but the acid blinded the tailor shop assistant’s eye and had disfigured his face. Through expert tracking, the officers arrested the perpetrator while in possession of a knife and a bottle of acid.

The acid throwing victim told the judges at Branch 71 of Tehran Penal Court: “I don’t know the individual who threw the acid, and I don’t know why he ruined my life. He had mistaken me, and I don’t know for what sin I became the victim in this story. My left eye has been removed completely and I have lost 80% of my vision in my right eye. My right ear lobe has burnt completely and 90% of my eyebrows and 36% of my body have also been damaged. Now I request Qisas (retribution) for the suspect’s facial parts.

The suspect admitted during his confessions that he had mistakenly aimed for the victim, stated the government run paper Iran Daily. Therefore Judge Nourollah Aziz Mohammadi, Head and two councilor judges of Branch 71 of the Tehran Province Penal Courts unanimously sentenced Hamid to Qisas in his left eye and his right earlobe, and payment of diyah (blood money), and transferred him to prison on temporary detention orders. With the suspect’s objection to the court ruling, Judges in the Sixth Branch of the Supreme Court upheld the decision and ordered that the sentence of gauging the eye and cutting of ear lobe be carried out through any means other than use of acid.