Government Pressure on Families Seeking Justice; Maryam Mehrabi Sentenced to Six Years in Prison

Continuing the pressure on families seeking justice, the Islamic Revolutionary Court of Isfahan sentenced Maryam Mehrabi, a teacher and sister of the justice-seeking Mahmoud Mehrabi, to six years in prison along with supplementary penalties. According to HRANA, the media organ of human rights activists in Iran, the six-year prison sentence and supplementary penalties for Maryam Mehrabi were recently issued by the first branch of the Revolutionary Court of Isfahan, presided over by Mohammad Reza Tavakoli, and were communicated to this political prisoner on Sunday, August 5. Ms. Mehrabi was sentenced to one year in prison for the charge of 'propaganda against the regime' and five years for 'inciting or provoking people to war and killing with the intent to disrupt national security.' The Revolutionary Court also issued supplementary penalties of 'two years of service deprivation and two years of exit ban' for her. Maryam Mehrabi's conviction comes as her sister, Hajar, emphasizes that 'she is only seeking justice.' Furthermore, the fifth branch of the Islamic Revolutionary Court of Isfahan sentenced Mahmoud Mehrabi, a political prisoner arrested during nationwide protests, to death in May of this year on charges of 'corruption on earth.' According to Mr. Mehrabi's lawyer, there are '10 fundamental flaws' in the death sentence, and an appeal has been filed with the Supreme Court of the Islamic Republic. Another part of Maryam Mehrabi's case regarding the charge of 'spreading falsehoods' is ongoing in the second criminal court of Isfahan, and no ruling has been issued for it yet. Meanwhile, the justice-seeking sister of Mahmoud Mehrabi has been 'deprived of the right to access a lawyer' and, according to HRANA, 'recently went on a hunger strike in protest of her continued uncertainty in solitary confinement.' Maryam Mehrabi was arrested on June 19 while accompanied by her young children. Previously, she had also been arrested in March 2023 while pursuing her brother Mahmoud Mehrabi's case by intelligence agents at the prosecutor's office of Mobarakeh County and was transferred to Dowlatabad Prison in Isfahan, but was released three days later on 'bail.' In September 2023, Ms. Mehrabi was sentenced to 74 lashes and three months in prison in the second criminal court of Mobarakeh, but this sentence was converted to a monetary fine. The pressure from the judicial authorities of the Islamic Republic on families seeking justice continues, including the arrest of Ali Adinehzadeh, the father of the justice-seeking protester Abolfazl Adinehzadeh, who was killed, and Mashallah Karami, the father of the executed protester Mohammad Mehdi Karami, who has also been deprived of medical treatment. Mona Bakhtiari, whose brother Pouya was killed in the November 2019 protests, and whose mother Nahid Shirpich and father Manouchehr Bakhtiari were imprisoned for seeking justice, recently stated that the lives of her parents are in danger in the prisons of the Islamic Republic.