Stoning Sentence Issued for a Woman in Gilan

Reports indicate that the head of the judiciary in Siyahkal, Gilan province, stated that a woman in this county has been sentenced to stoning for the charge of "adultery" and to 25 years in prison for "aiding in the intentional murder" of her husband, Arash Babaei Pour Tabrizi Nejad. Abbas Parsamanesh, the head of the judiciary in Siyahkal, announced on December 8 that according to the ruling of the second branch of the criminal court in Gilan province, Mr. "R-A" known by the alias "S" has been sentenced to "one instance of qisas" (retribution) for the murder of Arash Babaei Pour Tabrizi Nejad. According to Mr. Parsamanesh, Ms. "A-K" known by the alias "A" and Mr. "S-A" have also been sentenced to 25 years in prison for "aiding in the intentional murder" of Arash Babaei Pour Tabrizi Nejad. He also reported that the court sentenced Ms. "A-K" to stoning for the charge of "adultery" and Mr. "R-A" to 100 lashes for "fornication". According to this report, if the stoning sentence is not carried out, "with the proposal of the issuing court and the approval of the head of the judiciary", Ms. "A-K" will be sentenced to death. Under Islamic Penal Law, sexual relations of married women or men with individuals other than their spouses, outside of religious frameworks, is termed "adultery" and sexual relations outside of religious frameworks for single individuals is termed "fornication". The local website "Lahig" also published a report similar to that of the "Dar Siyahkal" website regarding the rulings in this case. According to this website, Arash Babaei Pour Tabrizi Nejad was injured in his bedroom in 2014 "with a knife and sharp object" and died after being transferred to the emergency room. According to this website, law enforcement and judicial officials have stated that "the victim's wife, with a prior relationship and coordination with the first defendant, asked him to kill her husband." According to these officials, the first defendant "confessed" to committing adultery with the victim's wife. The issuance of the stoning sentence in this case comes at a time when the stoning sentence for Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani in previous years received significant global attention. She was arrested in 2005 on charges of complicity in her husband's murder and was sentenced to stoning for "adultery". Mohammad Javad Larijani, the secretary of the Human Rights Headquarters of the judiciary of the Islamic Republic, had previously stated that there was a good chance of saving Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani's life. In this context, the issuance of a stoning sentence for a defendant in Qaemshahr has raised discussions about replacing stoning with other punishments in Iran.