Rapist, robber and kidnapper acquitted by regime

Persian2English, In the midst of opposition protests in the month of February in Iran, a court ruling on a series of violent rapes and robberies in Tehran went unnoticed. A 27 year old man nicknamed the “Black Scorpion” was acquitted on the charges of kidnapping, raping, and robbing 30 women and girls.

The Accounts of Some of the Victims

Posing as a private taxi driver, he took his passengers to the outskirts of the city to rape and rob them. Fahimeh is one of his victims. She told Fars News Agency that she hired a cab on March 1, 2009. The “cab driver” used traffic as an excuse to take her to a remote area (on the hills around Robat-e Karim). He repeatedly attacked her with an electric shocker (taser gun) until she became paralyzed, then he violently raped her, and dumped her semi-unconscious body in a well. From prison, the defendant made several threatening phone calls to Fahimeh. She was forced to change locations.

Elham, another one of his victims, tells a similar story. After withdrawing a large sum of money from a bank, she waved for the defendant’s car so she can go to her husband’s workplace. The defendant offered her a date to eat. She accepted and felt dizzy right after. He repeatedly attacked her with an electric shocker, which made her lose control of her muscles. He then took her to the hills of Rebat-e Karim and violently assaulted her. The assailant then gave her two choices: either he could run her over with his car or strangle her to death. At the end, he left her battered [but alive] in a hole.

Elham’s husband divorced her after this incident. She, too, has received several threats by the family members of “Black Scorpion”. She has moved locations and changed her child’s school three times, but the family members of the defendant have been able to find the new addresses and continue on with their threats. The family claims to have ties to a well-known businessman in the iron market who uses his influence.

S.M., another of one the defendant’s victims was also kidnapped and raped in a similar fashion.

Legal Procedure

The defendant was finally caught while fighting a woman in the deserts around Tehran. He admitted to the rapes during his interrogation session, but in the court, he recanted his confession. He said, “I only kidnapped the women and girls to steal their jewelry and other valuable belongings. Thus, their claim of rape is baseless.”

Branch 77 of the Tehran Provincial Criminal Court and four advising judges sentenced him to death. However, the Supreme Court overturned the death sentence because the defendant was able to win the consent of some of the victims (most likely through intimidation).

The case was sent to branch 79 of the Tehran Provincial Criminal Court and he was acquitted. Out of the 30 victims he had sexually assaulted, only two came to testify at the trial. They were threatened outside the courtroom by the defendant’s family.

In an article on Gooya News, writer Shokooh Mirzadegi recounts a family member of one of the victims telling her, “[I] swear to God, we are no different than the people who the Islamic Republic throws in the jails and rapes. We are like those who are shot on the streets. The difference is that those people are honoured for being jailed, raped, and killed for their country, and we are left to feel ashamed because we are unable to talk about what the regime’s agents, including Black Scorpion, have done to us. Please let our voices be heard as well. It is not only our families, but there are many Iranian women who are at risk of being raped by these scorpions…everyone knows Black Scorpion is backed by the powerful IRGC members, but nobody dares to say it. These 30 women were intimidated into not coming to the court [to testify]. Or, when they showed up, they were not permitted to speak freely.”

According to Mirzadegi, the defendant, when imprisoned, became involved in “reciting the Qur’an” and turned into an “ardent regime loyalist”. Consequently, the prison and judicial officials provided him with the contact information of his victims so he would be able to call and intimidate them. His threats often targeted the children of the women. He had information about the names and schools of his victims’ children.

He was seen smiling throughout the trial, and every time a victims raised her voice, the judges threatened her with arrest. A large group, who claimed to be family members of Black Scorpion, were active in intimidating the victims and their families throughout the trial.