Iran | Executions in Zahedan, Borujerd, Yazd, Khorramabad, Isfahan, Mashhad, Karaj

Iranian authorities have executed nine prisoners, including two Lor and two Baloch men, across prisons in Zahedan, Borujerd, Yazd, Khorramabad, Isfahan and Mashhad. The prisoners, identified as Taha Khavari, Lotfollah Ahmadvand, Omid Shahouzehi, Ali Asghar Salarzehi, Saleh Zeidabadi, Merat Zeidabadi, Mahmoud Talebi, Hossein Hessari and Faramarz Baghbani, had been sentenced to death in separate cases on drug-related or murder charges.

According to information obtained by the Hengaw Organization for Human Rights, Ali Asghar Salarzehi, a 42-year-old Baloch man from Zabol, was executed at Yazd Central Prison at dawn on August 25, 2026.

Salarzehi was arrested seven years ago on drug-related charges and subsequently sentenced to death. He was transferred to the prison’s quarantine section on August 23 in preparation for his execution.

On the same day, Omid Shahouzehi (Ali Akbar), a 26-year-old Baloch man, was executed at Zahedan Central Prison. Shahouzehi, who was married and the father of two children, was arrested four years ago on a murder charge and subsequently sentenced to death.

A day earlier, on August 24, Saleh Zeidabadi, 42, and his nephew Merat Zeidabadi, 31, both from Fahraj in Kerman province, were executed at Isfahan Central Prison without being granted a final family visit or their families being notified in advance.

The two men had been arrested five years earlier on drug-related charges and subsequently sentenced to death.

On August 23, Mahmoud Talebi, a 44-year-old man from Torbat-e Heydarieh in Razavi Khorasan province and father of one child, and Hossein Hessari, 35, from Mashhad, were executed at Mashhad Central Prison.

Talebi had been arrested four years earlier and Hessari five years earlier on drug-related charges. Both were subsequently sentenced to death. They were transferred to solitary confinement on August 22 in preparation for their executions.

Taha Khavari, a 37-year-old man from Behshahr in Mazandaran province, was executed at Khorramabad Central Prison on June 21, 2026. He had been arrested four years earlier on drug-related charges and subsequently sentenced to death.

Separately, Lotfollah Ahmadvand, a Lor man from Aligudarz, was executed at Isfahan Central Prison on an earlier date. He had been arrested three years earlier on drug-related charges.

Faramarz Baghbani, a 46-year-old Lor man and father of two children, was executed at Borujerd Prison on August 18, 2026. He had been sentenced to death following his arrest three years earlier on drug-related charges.

Iranian state media and judicial authorities have not publicly announced any of the executions.

Two brothers executed in Qezel Hesar Prison

Saeed Najafi and Hamid Najafi, two brothers from Kuhdasht, Lorestan Province, have been executed in Qezel Hesar Prison in Karaj after being sentenced to death on the charge of “waging war against God through armed robbery.”

According to information received by the Hengaw Organization for Human Rights, the executions were carried out at dawn on Tuesday, August 25, 2026.

The brothers were arrested by security and law enforcement forces approximately two years ago. Their cases were jointly tried before a Revolutionary Court, which sentenced both to death on the same charge.

The executions have not been announced by state media or the Iranian judiciary.

Source: Hengaw, Staff, August 25-26, 2026

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

Death Penalty News For a World without the Death Penalty

Comments

Saudi Arabia executes two Bangladeshis over 'immoral act' inside mosque

Saudi Arabia has carried out the death penalty on two Bangladeshi nationals in Mecca. The country's Interior Ministry announced this in a statement on Wednesday. According to the report, they were sentenced over allegations of involvement in immoral acts inside a mosque in Mecca. The information was reported by Ajel News, citing the Saudi Interior Ministry's statement. The two Bangladeshis executed were a man and a woman, Nazrul Islam Abdul Basir and Sithi Akhter. The “immoral acts” referred to illicit heterosexual intercourse, not homosexual activity.

Florida | Former firefighter, police officer sentenced to death in Fort Pierce killing

Otto Lenke, a Sebastian resident and former Indian River County firefighter/paramedic, as well as a former Melbourne police officer, was convicted in May 2026 of first-degree murder with a firearm and first-degree arson for the February 2021 killing of Richard Benson, owner of Fast Frank’s Cycle Concepts in Fort Pierce. SEBASTIAN—A Nineteen Judicial Circuit judge on Tuesday sentenced former Indian River County firefighter and Melbourne police officer Otto Lenke of Sebastian to death for the 2021 killing of a Fort Pierce motorcycle shop owner.

Florida | William Reaves set to be executed on Oct. 20 at 6 p.m.

With his execution date looming, convicted killer William Reaves will soon be moved from Raiford's Union Correctional Institution to a death watch cell in nearby Florida State Prison, a maximum-security complex also known as "The Rock." Reaves, 77, a former Gifford resident in Indian River County who’s been on death row for 38 years, is scheduled to die by lethal injection on Oct. 20 at 6 p.m. His execution will fulfill a sentence of death imposed for the 1986 fatal shooting of Indian River County Sheriff’s Cpl. Richard “Raz” Raczkoski outside a Zippy Mart store on State Road 60 west of Vero Beach.

Saudi Arabia executes woman, 'terrorists', 'indecent' couple, and juvenile offenders

Saudi Arabia carried out a series of executions in mid-October, including that of a woman convicted of killing her mother and attempting to kill her sister, alongside five men in the Eastern Province. Official statements described the five as terrorists; human rights groups described them as political prisoners sentenced under discretionary (ta’zir) penalties, one of whom was a child at the time of the alleged acts. The cases illustrate the kingdom’s continued use of the death penalty under Sharia, its stated commitment to public order and justice, and criticism from human rights organizations over the scope of capital punishment.

Christa Pike's Survival Wasn't a Miracle. That's What Should Scare Us.

What happened in Tennessee's execution chamber is one of the most common failures in medicine Christa Pike is awake. A week after Tennessee strapped her to a gurney and gave her two doses of pentobarbital , she is off the ventilator and speaking from a hospital bed, still shackled to it. Her lawyers call her recovery " medically unprecedented. " Legal scholars say she is the first person in American history to survive a lethal injection after the drug was actually given. I understand the impulse to make such claims. I consulted for Pike's legal team, but I have also spent three decades in operating rooms and intensive care units (ICUs), and I want to resist the word "unprecedented" and the word "miracle" that hovers just behind it.

Saudi Arabia executes five on terrorism charges

DUBAI — Saudi Arabia executed five people Saturday on terrorism charges, the ministry of interior said, bringing the total number of death sentences carried out this year to 188, according to an AFP tally based on official statements. The five Saudi nationals were convicted of “joining a foreign terrorist organization," opening fire on security forces and “providing support” for “terrorist operations inside the kingdom." Their executions were carried out in the Eastern Province, home to most of Saudi Arabia’s Shia Muslim minority, which has long complained of marginalization in the Sunni-majority country.

Indiana Parole Board hears testimony on clemency for man scheduled for Nov. 5 execution

Jeffrey Weisheit set his house on fire in 2010, killing his girlfriend’s two young children he was watching. The Indiana Parole Board will now make a recommendation in the coming days to Governor Mike Braun on whether to grant clemency to condemned killer Jeffrey Weisheit. Jeffrey is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection on Nov. 5 for the 2010 murder of his girlfriend's 2 children in Vanderburgh County.

Florida executes James Robertson

STARKE, Fla. — A Florida prisoner who said he killed his cellmate specifically to get on death row was executed Tuesday, nearly 18 years after the attack. James Robertson, 63, declined to offer any last words before receiving a three-drug injection and was pronounced dead about 10 minutes later. It was a stark contrast to the failed execution of Christa Pike in Tennessee two weeks ago, where she was rushed to the hospital after surviving two lethal doses of pentobarbital.

Florida Set to Execute Man Who Said He Killed to Reach Death Row, Challenging Misconception that Death Penalty Deters Crime

Florida is scheduled to execute James Robertson at noon on Tuesday, October 13, at Florida State Prison. His execution remains scheduled despite the withdrawal of William Lee Thompson’s death warrant, which had called for a 2nd execution that evening. If completed, this will be Florida’s 17th execution of 2026. Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (FADP) and partners will be holding a series of vigils and demonstrations across the state.

Christa Pike: 4 Major Questions As She Returns to Death Row

As Christa Pike returns to death row after surviving Tennessee’s attempt to execute her, several questions remain about her case and what comes next. Pike, 50, was discharged from hospital and moved back to the Debra K. Johnson Rehabilitation Center, the women’s prison where she was housed for 30 years, her attorneys said on Saturday. She was hospitalized after surviving 2 doses of the lethal drug pentobarbital as Tennessee attempted to execute her on September 30. Pike was sentenced to death for the 1995 murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer, her classmate at a Job Corps training program in Knoxville, Tennessee. Pike was 18 at the time.

Death Penalty News

Search This Blog