Mohammad Reza Hadadi is now a young man who has been serving time in an Iranian prison for more than 18 years. He was 15 when he was arrested. Now he is 33.
Ever since he was a teenager, Hadadi has spent every night fearing execution. He has forgotten the taste of life and has no vision about it anymore. Worse, he does not even remember making a living. Because of the inhuman laws of the Iranian judiciary, he has been placed among the dangerous prisoners ward.
The authorities have claimed that he killed another person in his childhood. But at the start of his case 18 years ago, he wrote that he was innocent. Now after 18 years he is saying the same thing in his letter again.
“They had fooled me to accept the crime of murder.” The regime’s judiciary has summoned him for execution many times during these long and hard years but every time they have delayed it.
Now he says that he cannot tolerate this situation anymore. He cannot tolerate being imprisoned anymore. He cannot live anymore with the nightmare of being executed. He is asking that his case be reviewed again. Below is his letter:
“Calling the Lord of Hope
Hello,
The head of the judiciary, for once, after 18 years of imprisonment from my adolescence and young ages in Adelabad Prison, please give me an answer.
I am Mohammad Reza Haddadi, son of Nasrollah, born on March 17, 1988 and I was under my mother’s supervision. Then on August 19, 2003 at the age of 15, I was planning to go to Shiraz, I become a passenger of someone who had two other passengers in his car before me. He took another two passengers in between the way.
Then the driver dropped one of them in a place named Mozafar Abad. In between the way, one of the passengers asked the driver to stop the car to go to a toilet, then the driver stopped at Tangeh Abolhayat. The person who asked for toilet then attacked the driver from the back and killed him with the help of the two other persons who were family members of my father. In the middle of the night, I was very scared, and when I was just 15, I witnessed such a crime.
“Then one of the passengers, Mehdi Sassani son of Mohamad Ali, 22, resident of Khesht and Kenartakhteh, threatened me with murder. But Mohammad Taghi Hadadi son of Gholamreza, 19, and Karim Hadadi son of Keramat, 18, who were the family members of my father’s family prevented Mehdi Sasani from killing me.”
Then at the time of being arrested, I was tortured physically and mentally at the police station. At the court of the Kazeroun county, I was fooled by Mohamad Taghi Hadadi and Mehdi Sasani and a policeman, captain Sadrollah Hekamdpoor, and I accepted the crime of Mohamad Taghi Hadadi who had killed the driver with a car propeller belt.
In the prison of Kazeroun county I found out that they have deceived me with false temptations and have assigned their own crime to me.
In this event I am completely innocent. Now after 18 years I am imprisoned in Shiraz’s Adel Abad prison, because of a crime I did not commit. I am asking you as the head of the Judiciary to enter in my case and help me out.
Dear head of the Judiciary, I’m not a killer. Please listen to me and stop the execution of an innocent person. Now I have been for more than 18 years behind the bars of the prison and denied my entire adolescent lifetime, and I hope to prove that I am innocent.
I have no other support than the God almighty. Please help me. I swear by God that I am innocent and cannot tolerate the prison anymore.
Mohamad Reza Hadadi, born on March 17, 1988
This case is just one of the examples of the injustices in Iran and especially by its judiciary which is tied with extreme human rights violations. Every year, many innocent people are executed because the regime needs this lever to suppress the people and spread fear. On many occasions, the regime has been warned and condemned by the international community for executing minors or juvenile offenders.
