Mehdi Reyshahri-Tangestani was sentenced to six years in prison in connection with his Facebook activity, blasphemy, and for insulting the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and the founder of the Islamic Republic, Ayatollah Khomeini. He is currently serving a sentence at Evin Prison. His request to be released on bail was rejected by the appeals court.
Name: Mehdi Reyshahri-Tangestani
Career: Citizen journalist; Facebook user and cyber activist.
Charges: Assembly with the intent to act against national security, insulting the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and the founder of the Islamic Republic, Ayatollah Khomeini, and blasphemy.
Up to a few months before his arrest, Mehdi Reyshahri-Tangestani worked in a Compressed Natural Gas workshop in Tehran and was the administrator for the company’s Facebook page. The Cyber Police Unit of the Revolutionary Guards arrested Reyshahri-Tangestani on October 24, 2013 as part of a clampdown on Facebook users. He was taken to Cell Block 2A of Evin Prison, an area controlled by the Guards.
During interrogations, he was pressured and tortured into making a confession on television about the evils and corruptive influence of using social networks such as Facebook.
He was tried at Branch 28 of the Revolutionary Court presided over by Judge Moghisei, who sentenced him to 11 years in prison. He objected to the lower court’s verdict and appealed the decision but his request to be released on bail was rejected by the court.
He was sentenced to five years under Article 610 of the Islamic Penal Code for assembly with the intent to act against national security and one year for insulting the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, and the founder of the republic, Ayatollah Khomeini.
For more information, visit Journalism is Not a Crime, documenting cases of jailed journalists in Iran.
This is part of IranWire’s series Crime: Journalism, a portfolio on the legal and political persecution of Iranian journalists and bloggers, published in both Persian and English.
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