Kurdistan Human Rights Network (KHRN) has been informed that the amputation sentence of four fingers of the right hand” of two imprisoned brothers accused of robbery at Orumiyeh Central Prison, -Shahab and Mehrdad Teymouri- which was previously issued in Branch 1 of the Orumiyeh Juvenile Court.
Mehrdad Teymouri was born on September 21, 1990, and Shahab Teymouri was born on June 10, 1985, in Sarpol-e Zahab. Both brothers are residents of Karaj.”Shahab and Mehrdad Teymouri and another person named Ibrahim Khatibi were arrested on December 8, 2018, in Mallard, Karaj, on charges of robbery.”, a source familiar with the case of the two prisoners told KHRN
According to the indictment by the Orumiyeh police office, the three prisoners resident in Karaj have a history of robbery for which they were convicted of returning the stolen funds and property. They were arrested in Mallard of Karaj relation to another robbery case in Orumiyeh in order to repay the aforementioned debt concerning the return of the stolen funds and property.
According to the source, “On Apr 22 last year, the trial of the three prisoners was held in Branch 1 of the Orumiyeh Youth Criminal Court, and all three were sentenced to amputation of their right hand for robbery.”
“After the protest of the Public defender, the three prisoners cases were referred to the 24 Supreme Court and the sentences of Shahab and Mehrdad Teymouri were upheld while Ibrahim Khatibi’s sentence was overturned.”, the source further added. Four other prisoners, Hadi Rostami, Mehdi Sharafian, Mehdi Shahivand, and Kasra Karami, had also been sentenced to amputation of their fingers in relation to another “robbery ” case. Their case was sent to the Supreme Court for enforcement. Moreover, in July of this year, another prisoner named Arash Ali Akbari was sentenced to the same sentence, and the case was appealed in the Supreme Court.
Following the announcement of the final verdict of Amputation Sentence of these four prisoners in the Supreme Court and the publication of the lawsuits by the KHRN, Mehdi Keshtdar, managing director of the Judiciary News Agency, denied the news on his Twitter account. “The response to an enquiry made by the Judiciary Media Centre to the judiciary of West Azerbaijan Province shows that the claim made in some foreign media about the amputation sentence of the three youth offenders is not true.
The World Medical Association (WMA) wrote a letter to the Iranian authorities on October 25, protesting against the approval of the following sentence, calling for the abolition of the amputation penalty leads to irreversible disabilities and destroys human dignity.WMA also stressed that such acts do not have a place in a country based on the rule of law. “Enforcing such sentences requires physicians to participate in acts of torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading punishments.” WMA has also promised to support any Iranian physician who refuses to take part in the amputation of prisoners’ fingers as a form of punishment.
The Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment prohibits the use of inhumane punishments such as amputation. Although Iran has signed the Universal Declaration of Civil and Political Rights, it is one of the few countries that has not acceded to the International Convention against Torture and continues to use amputation penalties for many crimes.
