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Electric Shocks, Beatings: Iranian Protester Describes Time in Jail

April 12, 2023
Roghayeh Rezaei
3 min read
Ali Bahrampour's ordeal began after he attended a November 2022 ceremony in Karaj, near Tehran, for a victim of the brutal crackdown by the authorities on protests that erupted following the death of Mahsa Amini in police custody
Ali Bahrampour's ordeal began after he attended a November 2022 ceremony in Karaj, near Tehran, for a victim of the brutal crackdown by the authorities on protests that erupted following the death of Mahsa Amini in police custody
The man, who authored 15 books on social communication technology, was sentenced to a total of eight years, but he managed to flee the country after being granted a temporary leave from prison
The man, who authored 15 books on social communication technology, was sentenced to a total of eight years, but he managed to flee the country after being granted a temporary leave from prison
After being beaten for a few hours, the inmate was taken to an interrogation room where he was subjected to electronic shocks and was beaten with a stick
After being beaten for a few hours, the inmate was taken to an interrogation room where he was subjected to electronic shocks and was beaten with a stick

Ali Bahrampour's ordeal began after he attended a November 2022 ceremony in Karaj, near Tehran, for a victim of the brutal crackdown by the authorities on protests that erupted following the death of Mahsa Amini in police custody.

In an interview with InranWire, Bahrampour, 39, said that he spent nearly three months in an un-official detention center and a prison in the northwestern city of Qazvin, where he was threatened, tortured and forced to confess to crimes he had not committed.

The man, who authored 15 books on social communication technology, was sentenced to a total of eight years, but he managed to flee the country after being granted a temporary leave from prison.

As police clashed with the mourners attending the ceremony in Karaj, Bahrampour asked a passing car to take him to the Caspian city of Bandar Anzali, where he could find a safe place to hide, he told IranWire.

About an hour later, he and the driver were sitting in a roadside restaurant when they were detained by 21 men, both armed and unarmed. 

He was taken to a detention center controlled by the Qazvin City Intelligence Department. Over the past months, security forces have transferred detained protesters in mosques, schools and other non-official detention centers, where they subjected them to acts of torture and other ill-treatment.

During the first few hours after his arrest, Bahrampour’s jailers said he would be sentenced to death because he had published a video "teaching people how to defend themselves against the oppressors’ batons with a water pipe."

"They took me outside, removed my clothes in a yard-like area and took pictures of my tattoos,” Bahrampour said. “They hit my tattoos with a stick, and a tall man slapped me, saying, 'Do you teach people to fight? You thought we couldn't find you?’ Later, I found out that he was my interrogator and that he was named Hosseini. He also threatened to execute me."

After being beaten for a few hours, the inmate was taken to an interrogation room where he was subjected to electronic shocks and was beaten with a stick.

After that he spent more than 20 hours in a solitary cell without being given food or water.

Bahrampour was forced to confess to teaching violent practices on the internet, a claim he denies. State media has published a heavily edited video of Bahrampour's “confession.”

During his 85-day temporary detention in Qazvin’s overcrowded Chobindar prison, Bahrampour was beaten until he gave the password of his mobile phone. He also witnessed systematic harassment of other political and ideological prisoners.

“Many prisoners did not even have a blanket and had to sleep on the carpeted floor. We were allowed to use the phones for only two hours, and almost 400 people had to use four phones to make calls,” he said.

“If we asked about the protests on the phone, they would immediately stop the communication and would not allow us to make any calls for several days. They harassed us as much as possible and did not provide dinner for the entire hall, or lunch for example. When there were 350 people, they only brought food for 100. The prison had a store, but they didn’t open it for five days, preventing us from even buying an egg,” he added.

Bahrampour was sentenced to five years in prison for "inciting people to fight and kill each other with the intention of disrupting the country’s security.” He received another two-year sentence for "insulting the leadership" and one year for "propaganda activity against the Islamic Republic".

He was also banned from leaving the country for two years and had his mobile phone confiscated.

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