Iran | Executions in Tabriz, Karaj, Mashhad, Buin Zahra

Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO); September 18, 2025: Zahra Fotouhi and Morteza Shirkhani, a woman and a man on death row for separate murders, were executed in Tabriz Central Prison.

According to information obtained by Iran Human Rights, a woman and a man were hanged in Tabriz Central Prison on 17 September 2025. Their identities have been established as 52-year-old Zahra Fotouhi from Tabriz and 40-year-old Morteza Shirkhani from Tabriz. They were sentenced to qisas (retribution-in-kind) for separate murders.

An informed source told IHRNGO: “Zahra was arrested for the murder of her ex-husband five years ago. After divorcing her first husband and nine years of marriage with her second husband, she was accused of killing the first husband for stalking her. Morteza was arrested for the murder of his friend over financial issues four years ago.”

At the time of writing, their executions have not been reported by domestic media or officials in Iran.

Zahra Fotouhi is the 27th woman execution recorded in 2025 and the 19th to be hanged for murder. Iran executes the highest number of women globally. In 2024, at least 31 women were executed for drug-related, murder and security-related charges in Iran, the highest number of recorded women executions in more than 15 years.

In January 2025, IHRNGO published a report titled “Women and the Death Penalty in Iran; a Gendered Perspective,” which sheds light on the contemporary experiences of women facing the death penalty, focusing on the discriminatory laws and societal factors that perpetuate their suffering.

Those charged with the umbrella term of “intentional murder” are sentenced to qisas (retribution-in-kind) regardless of intent or circumstances due to a lack of grading in law. Once a defendant has been convicted, the victim’s family are required to choose between death as retribution, diya (blood money) or forgiveness.

Crucially, while an indicative amount is set by the Judiciary every year, there is no legal limit to how much can be demanded by families of the victims. IHRNGO has recorded many cases where defendants are executed because they cannot afford to pay the blood money. Should the victim’s family choose execution, they are not only encouraged to attend, but also to physically carry out the execution themselves.

According to IHRNGO’s 2024 Annual Report on the Death Penalty, at least 419 people including a juvenile offender and 19 women, were executed for murder charges, the highest number of qisas executions since 2010. Only 12% of the recorded qisas executions were announced by official sources. In 2024, Iran Human Rights also recorded 649 cases of families choosing diya or forgiveness instead of qisas executions. In the first eight months of 2025, at least 375 people were executed for murder charges in Iran.

At Least 7 Men Hanged for Drug Offences in Ghezel Hesar Prison

Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO); September 18, 2025: At least seven men were executed in Ghezel Hesar Prison (Karaj) on Tuesday and Wednesday. Massoud Okhatizadeh, Akbar Emami, Ali Esmaili, Majid Hosseini, Omid Hassanzadeh, Rahman Sarlak and an unidentified Afghan national were all on death row for drug-related offences. Babak Shahbazi is confirmed to have been executed in a group hanging of six at the prison.

According to information obtained by Iran Human Rights, at least two men were hanged in Ghezel Hesar Prison on 16 September 2025. Their identities have been established as Massoud Okhatizadeh from Kouhdasht and Akbar Emami from Nourabad in Lorestan. They were both sentenced to death on drug-related charges.

The next day, on 17 September, five other men were executed in a group hanging at the prison. Four of them have been identified as Ali Esmaili, Majid Hosseini from Lorestan, Omid Hassanzadeh and Rahman Sarlak from Kouhdasht. The fifth man, an Afghan national, has not been identified at the time of writing. They were all also on death row for drug-related offences.

An informed source told IHRNGO: “Majid Hosseini was arrested six years ago. Omid Hassanzadeh was arrested for 2 kilograms of shisheh (methamphetamines) and one kilogram and 700 grams of heroin. Rahman was arrested for 10 kilograms of narcotics four years ago.”

At the time of writing, none of their executions have been reported by domestic media or officials in Iran.

State media reported the execution of Babak Shahbazi on 17 September. According to newly confirmed information, Babak was executed in a group hanging of six in Ghezel Hesar Prison.

Drug-related executions have continuously risen every year since 2021. According to IHRNGO’s 2024 Annual Report on the Death Penalty, at least 503 people were executed for drug-related charges, of which only under 3% were announced by official sources. 17% of all drug-related executions in 2024 were Baluch minorities while they represent 2-6% of Iran’s population. At least 426 people were executed for drug-related offences in the first eight months of 2025.

Execution in Mashhad

Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO); September 17, 2025: Sajad Mohajer, a man on death row for murder, was executed in Mashhad Central Prison.

According to Khorasan newspaper, a man was hanged in Mashhad (Vakil Abad) Central Prison on 14 September 2025. Only named as Sajad M, he was sentenced to qisas (retribution-in-kind) for murder by the Criminal Court. However, previous reports by other state media identified him as Sajad Mohajer who was accused of killing another man during a fight in Mashhad’s Omat Park on 2 April 2023.

Execution in Buin Zahra

Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO); September 16, 2025: Ali Osat Akbari, a man on death row for murder, was executed in Buin Zahra Prison.

According to information obtained by Iran Human Rights, a man was hanged in Buin Zahra Prison on 21 August 2025. His identity has been established as Ali Osat Akbari, a 50-year-old man from the village of Shakhdar in Qazvin province. He was arrested seven years ago and sentenced to qisas (retribution-in-kind) for murder by the Criminal Court.

An informed source told IHRNGO: “Ali Osat Kbari was arrested for murder over a property dispute. He was sentenced to death while the victim and several of his friends had started the premeditated plan, and Ali had only got involved to defend himself.”

At the time of writing, his execution has not been reported by domestic media or officials in Iran.

Source: Iran Human Rights, Staff, September 17-18, 2025

"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted."

— Oscar Wilde

Comments

He Spent 27 Years on Death Row as a Wrongfully Convicted Man. What Comes Next?

23-hour solitary confinement. 115-degree heat. Jimmie Duncan is haunted by the decades he spent in Louisiana’s Angola Prison—and how, even after being released, he still isn’t truly free. Jimmie “Chris” Duncan wiped the sweat off his forehead as he assessed his temporary home from the parking lot of a rundown motel in central Louisiana. Sure, there’s drug dealing and prostitution, he said on a recent summer afternoon. And he suspected his neighbors were cooking meth on a floor below the room he paid $350 a week to rent.

Florida executes Harold Gene Lucas

Florida state officials executed 74-year-old Harold Gene Lucas by lethal injection on Tuesday evening, concluding a 50-year legal saga stemming from the 1976 murder of a 16-year-old girl in Bonita Springs. STARKE, Fla. -- A man convicted of killing a teenage girl who rejected his romantic advances and wounding two of her friends was put to death Tuesday in the first of three executions planned this month in Florida. Harold Gene Lucas, 74, was pronounced dead at 6:18 p.m. following a three-drug injection at Florida State Prison near Starke, authorities said. He was sentenced to death for the 1976 shooting attack on Jill Piper and the wounding of her friends, Richard Byrd Jr. and Terri Rice.

Ex-corrections officials urge governor to commute Kansas death sentences

Former Kansas corrections officials are urging Governor Laura Kelly to grant clemency to the state's death row inmates. Former Kansas Corrections Secretary Roger Werholtz has several reasons why he thinks the state should abolish the death penalty. Werholtz, who served as secretary from 2002 to 2010 and returned on an interim basis in 2019, uses his discussions with peers and family members of victims as well as experiences of seeing wrongly convicted people getting exonerated as his guiding points.

Florida set to carry out 14th execution this year in the nation's busiest death chamber

MIAMI (AP) — A Florida man convicted of fatally shooting a 16-year-old girl who rejected his romantic advances and wounding two of her friends is set to be executed Tuesday in the first of three lethal injections scheduled this month in the state. Harold Gene Lucas, 74, is set to receive a three-drug injection at Florida State Prison near Starke starting at 6 p.m. He would be the 14th prisoner put to death this year in Florida, and Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis has already signed death warrants for two more executions set for later this September.

Indiana high court sets Nov. 5 execution date for convicted child killer

The court’s decision came a little more than two months after Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita asked the justices to schedule Weisheit’s execution. State attorneys argued Weisheit had exhausted his state and federal appeals, had no active stay of execution, and could lawfully be put to death. The inmate’s attorneys opposed setting a date, saying they needed more time to pursue available legal proceedings and possible executive clemency. The defense additionally pointed to public records that it said showed the Indiana Department of Correction lacked the drugs needed to conduct an execution and had no lawful source from which to obtain them.

Oklahoma Sets November Execution Date for Air Force Veteran Jim Pavatt Amid Claims of Wrongful Conviction

OKLAHOMA CITY — The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals has scheduled the execution of Air Force veteran and longtime death row prisoner Jim Pavatt for Nov. 12, as his attorneys continue to challenge his conviction and contend that prosecutors relied on false arguments, disputed forensic evidence and an alleged confession they later described as bogus. Pavatt, who served nearly 22 years in the Air Force and rose to the rank of master sergeant, was convicted and sentenced to death for the 2001 killing of Rob Andrew in Oklahoma City. His execution is scheduled for the day after Veterans Day.

Arizona AG seeks execution date for man convicted in 1995 trooper killing

Trooper Bob Martin was killed during a traffic stop on the Beeline highway; execution for his killer could be as soon as January PHOENIX (AZFamily)—The Arizona Attorney General is asking for an execution date to be set for a man convicted in the killing of an Arizona State Trooper over 30 years ago. On Aug. 15, 1995, Trooper Bob Martin was shot and killed while performing a traffic stop along the Beeline Highway.

Iran Crackdown on Christians Intensifies, Ministry Reports Dozens Killed and Hundreds Detained

September 3, 2026: A widening crackdown on Christians in Iran has reportedly resulted in the deaths of at least 33 Christian ministers and the detention of more than 130 others in recent months, according to Iran Alive Ministries, a Texas-based organisation supporting underground house churches in the country. Hormoz Shariat, founder of Iran Alive Ministries, told Baptist Press that at least 33 Christian ministers associated with the ministry had been killed amid intensified government pressure on Christians linked to the underground church movement.

Hanging of Osaka Arsonist is Japan’s First Execution Under Takaichi Government

As a majority of the international community has abolished capital punishment. Japan and the U.S. are the only two countries in the Group of Seven leading industrialized nations that put people to death. The execution of Takami Sunao—an arsonist whose 2009 attack in Osaka killed five—on August 21, 2026, was Japan’s first use of capital punishment in just over a year. Over a Decade from Sentencing to Execution Takami Sunao was executed on August 21, 2026 , for a 2009 arson attack at an Osaka pachinko parlor that killed five people. In July 2009, Takami poured gasoline on the floor of a pachinko parlor in Osaka and set it alight, killing 5 customers and staff members and injuring 10 more. While the defense argued that he was in a state of diminished capacity, the Supreme Court finalized his death sentence in February 2016. The execution took place 17 years after the initial crime and 10 and a half years after the death sentence was finalized.

Florida | Jury recommends death sentence for Jeffrey Crum in killing of 12-year-old girl

BROOKSVILLE, Fla. — A Hernando County jury has recommended the death penalty for a 65-year-old man who was found guilty last week of raping and killing 12-year-old Jennifer Odom. Sentencing for Jeffrey Crum was held this week. Crum abducted Odom in 1993 after she stepped off her school bus in Pasco County. Her body was found in a Hernando County orange grove six days later.

Death Penalty News

Search This Blog