The death sentence issued for political prisoner Manouchehr Fallah, currently held in Lakan Prison in Rasht, reveals that the Revolutionary Court judge based the charge of moharebeh (waging war against God) on the very minor financial damage done to the door and facade of the Rasht courthouse.
According to the Rasht Revolutionary Court ruling, Fallah was accused of detonating a sound bomb on June 17, 2023, which caused 25 million rials (approximately $29) in damage to the door and facade of the Rasht courthouse and allegedly created “fear and panic.”
However, according to a report by the Iranian regime’s Ministry of Intelligence, the explosion occurred at 12:30 a.m., when no one was present in or around the courthouse building on Janbazan Street.
Lawyers state that the ruling is full of flaws and that the case file lacks the kind of evidence that would allow a judge to charge Fallah with moharebeh or issue an indictment and death sentence on that basis.
The judge who issued the ruling classified Fallah as a mohareb based on Articles 687, 283, 282, and 279 of the Islamic Penal Code. He argued that the courthouse is a “security building.”
However, according to the first note of the Islamic Penal Code, an act constitutes moharebeh only if it is committed with the intent to “disrupt public order and security and confront the Islamic government.”
Despite these conditions, the judge interpreted the use of a sound bomb—which caused only minor damage and injured no one, as no one was present—as constituting moharebeh.
A portion of the verdict refers to Article 183 of the Islamic Penal Code, which states that anyone who takes up arms to create fear and insecurity in society is considered a mohareb. The ruling adds: “It must be stated that the above crimes are not moharebeh themselves but are considered equivalent to moharebeh.”
Even within the Iranian regime’s judiciary, such an approach is unprecedented.
Previously, the regime’s judiciary accused dissenting or protesting citizens of moharebeh—usually based on unproven allegations of clashes with security forces or attempted killings—and issued death sentences accordingly.
According to available information, Fallah’s case has been referred to the Supreme Court following an appeal of the Revolutionary Court’s ruling and is currently awaiting review.
Fallah was arrested by agents of the Iranian regime’s Ministry of Intelligence at Rasht airport in June 2023 and transferred to Lakan Prison in the city after the end of his interrogations.
The political prisoner was initially charged in Branch 16 of the Rasht Prosecutor’s Office, and after much legal back-and-forth and the issuance of an indictment, his case was referred to the Rasht Revolutionary Court.
In this case, he faced charges including “propaganda against the regime,” “insulting Ali Khamenei, the leader of Iran’s regime,” “membership in the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK),” “destruction of public property,” and “manufacturing and using a homemade sound bomb.”
Additionally, from the beginning of his legal proceedings until the issuance of the death sentence, this political prisoner was denied access to legal counsel.
Issuance of Death Sentence and Assertion of Innocence
In November 2023, Fallah was tried by Branch 3 of the Rasht Revolutionary Court for one of his cases and sentenced to one year, three months, and one day in prison for “insulting Khamenei” and to seven months and 16 days for “propaganda against the regime.”
Earlier, in August 2023, Fallah had gone on hunger strike to protest the fabricated charges by the Iranian regime’s security apparatus and the deliberate obstruction of his case by the investigating prosecutor.
On February 12, 2025, in a letter to his daughter Asal on her 16th birthday, this political prisoner wrote: “On the eve of your birthday, Judge Mohammad Ali Darvish Goftar informed me of my death sentence, perhaps in hopes of forcing me to surrender.”
He added: “But he does not realize that the path I have chosen is not one I found in books, but one I learned through life and through the suffering of the people. Poverty and injustice have been my teachers, and now that this awareness has taken root in me, I consider silence in the face of it an unforgivable sin.”
In the same letter, Fallah reaffirmed his innocence, writing: “Dear Asal, they have imprisoned me for a crime I did not commit. I have neither violated anyone’s rights, nor looted any wealth, nor taken bread from anyone’s table. I have not stolen an oil rig, nor sat in a judge’s seat to issue unjust rulings. My only crime has been to speak out against poverty, inequality, and injustice; to refuse to remain silent in the face of all this oppression. Yet I have harmed no one and have used no violence in this path.”
Fallah was a tattoo artist and lived in Kish Island before his arrest. He is one of dozens of prisoners across Iran currently facing death sentences on political or security-related charges.
In recent months, the rise in executions and the issuance and confirmation of death sentences for political prisoners in Iran have sparked a wave of protests both inside and outside the country.
On May 2, 2025, 309 prominent legal experts, Nobel Peace Prize laureates, human rights activists, and civil and human rights organizations around the world signed a statement urging the United Nations to immediately intervene to stop the wave of executions of political prisoners in Iran.
The statement condemned the increasing wave of political executions in Iran and described it as part of the Iranian regime’s systematic campaign to suppress dissent.
