Majid Khademi Sentenced to 10 Years for Fabricated Charges

According to court documents received by Iran Human Rights, Branch One of the Mahshahr Revolutionary Court sentenced Majid Khademi to six years and three months imprisonment for “assembly and collusion against national security”, a year and four months for “propaganda against the system” and two years and six months for “membership in dissident groups.” He has also been sentenced to “two years of compulsory residence in Taft city in Yazd province” and “two-year ban on membership in political parties and groups” as additional punishment.

An informed source who wished to remain anonymous told Iran Human Rights: “Seyed Mehran Mehman Navaz, the judge at Branch One of the Mahshahr Revolutionary Court who made the ruling had stated that should Majid or his lawyer object, the prosecutor can also object in return. Since according to the unfair judicial procedures in the Revolutionary Courts, the prosecutor’s objection is accepted by the courts in such circumstances, Majid was forced to accept the ruling and didn’t appeal.”

According to Article 442 of the Criminal Procedural Laws, if the prosecutor does not appeal the judgement, the defendant can forfeit their right to appeal within the specified appeal period and request a sentence reduction. In this case, the court will process the request in extraordinary time with the presence of the prosecutor, and deduct up to a quarter of the determined punishment.

After the application of Article 442 in his case, the court has reduced his sentence by “an eighth.”

Majid Khademi is a 33-year-old activist from Tileh Kouhi village in Behbahan, Khuzestan province. He was first arrested by Ministry of Intelligence agents in Behbahan on 18 January 2022 and held in solitary confinement for a month before being transferred to Behbahan Prison.

He was charged with “propaganda against the system, arson and destruction of public property, disruption of public order, participation in the manufacturing of civilian incendiary materials, membership in organisations that disrupt security and efsad-fil-arz (corruption on earth which carries the death penalty)” by the Behbahan Public and Revolutionary Court.

After spending 18 months in pre-trial detention, he was released on a bail of 3.5 billion tomans on 15 June 2021.

On 22 June 2022, he was re-arrested at his trial at the Mahshahr Revolutionary Court. He was transferred to Sheiban Prison after the completion of his interrogation phase and subsequently released on a bail of 200 million tomans on 31 July 2022.

According to the informed source, Majid spent around two months in Sheiban Prison where he was denied medical care for the skin conditions he had contracted during his previous incarceration.