Sarina Rostami was 16 years old when someone fired a hunting rifle at her. The high school student from Sarpol-e-Zahab had refused a forced marriage. Her family called it suicide.
Fereshteh Darban, 29, played musical instruments and financially supported her family in Mashhad. Her father later confessed to police that he struck her face so hard it caused fatal bleeding, then mutilated her body to hide the evidence.
Maryam Jafari, a mother of four sons, endured years of violence from her husband and his family. When she finally sought a divorce, he stabbed her 17 times.
Vajiheh Rouzeh-Khan, 41, remarried to escape society’s judgment of divorced women. Her second husband shot her in the head inside a parked car before taking his own life.
Four women. One month. All were killed by male relatives who claimed to act in the name of family “honor.”
The cases, documented by IranWire over the past month, offer a glimpse into what women’s rights activists say is a persistent crisis of gender-based violence in Iran.
The lack of deterrent laws and a patriarchal culture that values “honor” over human life creates conditions for such killings to continue largely unpunished.
When news of Rostami’s death emerged on October 22, initial reports described her as a 25-year-old married woman.
IranWire’s investigation revealed she was, in fact, a teenage girl pressured into an engagement she desperately wanted to end.
According to sources close to the family, Sarina faced intense pressure to accept a forced marriage. When she opposed the engagement and decided to break it off, relatives say she paid with her life.
“She was severely injured by deadly blows from one of the men close to her and, after being hospitalized, lost her life due to internal bleeding,” one relative told IranWire.
Other reports cite “a shot from a hunting rifle” as the cause of death.
An official record shows Sarina was buried on October 22 at Gol Davood Cemetery in Sarpol-e-Zahab. But details about her death remain murky, and relatives refuse to name her killer.
“Under pressure from the men in the family, they have no choice but to say she committed suicide,” one relative said. “But evidence and accounts from several relatives do not match that narrative.”
No legal complaint has been filed against the perpetrators.
A women’s rights activist in Sarpol-e-Zahab told IranWire this pattern repeats itself regularly.
“Several women and girls are killed here every year in this manner, and no one files a complaint because either the bullet was fired by mistake or the woman is said to have committed suicide,” she said.
Most victims are young women under 30, and the killings often involve so-called “honor” issues, according to the activist.
In northeastern Mashhad, the case of Fereshteh Darban began as a missing person report on October 7.
The 29-year-old woman's disappearance, registered at the Kazemabad police station in Mashhad, prompted an investigation. Initial inquiries revealed family conflicts that led officers to focus on tensions within her home.
When police summoned Fereshteh’s father, Jalal Darban, 55, for questioning, they discovered major contradictions in his statements. Under interrogation, he eventually confessed to killing his daughter.
According to a source, Jalal told investigators, “My daughter married twice. The first time was when she was 15, which I forced her to do, but she got divorced.
The second time, she chose herself and got divorced again. She had mental and psychological problems and sometimes argued with family members, including her brothers. She insulted me and her brothers.”
On the day of the murder, after another verbal argument, Darban sent the rest of the family out of the house on various pretexts. He then struck Fereshteh in the face so hard that she suffered fatal bleeding, according to his confession.
Darban initially told police he put his daughter’s body in an orange bag and took it to an abandoned shop outside the city. When officers could not find the remains, he changed his story.
He later admitted to mutilating Fereshteh’s body for “easier transport” and trying to burn it in a desert outside Mashhad.
Friends describe Fereshteh differently from her father’s account of mental illness. They remember an artistic, athletic, and independent woman and athlete who worked to support her family.
“She never yielded to the control of her father and brothers. That’s why they accused her of being mentally ill,” said a source close to her.
At 15, her family forced her to marry a drug addict. When she discovered his addiction, she sought a divorce. The second marriage also ended amid family pressure, but Fereshteh refused to surrender her independence, a defiance that ultimately cost her life.
Her father’s case has been sent to Branch 258 of the General and Revolutionary Court of Mashhad for further proceedings.
Outside Tehran, in Robat Karim city, Maryam Jafari lost her father in childhood and had little memory of him. After her mother remarried, Maryam became part of a new family. At 14, she was forced into marriage.
Her husband and his family were notorious in Robat Karim and Nasirshahr for violent behavior, according to sources. Her father-in-law forced her to work even during pregnancy and after childbirth. Her husband was suspicious, verbally abusive, and physically violent, while interference from his sister intensified the abuse.
After several years, Maryam discovered that her husband used drugs and pseudo-antidepressants. In one incident, he suffered a seizure from an overdose. The addiction and volatility deepened her suffering.
She had four sons, the youngest less than a year old. Caring for them while enduring violence left her trapped, tormented, and exhausted.
Years earlier, according to a source close to the family, Maryam’s older sister-in-law [her husband’s brother's wife] had tried to report a violent domestic dispute involving a knife attack to authorities. She disappeared soon after, and her fate remains unknown.
Maryam told friends she believed her husband’s family was responsible for her older sister-in-law, Hajar’s disappearance. But as an orphan with no close family or acquaintances, no one pursued Hajar’s fate. These circumstances motivated Maryam to make a firm decision.
Eventually, Maryam resolved to divorce her husband.
On October 19, police reported that her husband stabbed her 17 times after she requested a divorce, then fled immediately.
One of her sons found her lifeless body, bloodied, and called the police.
During the investigation, he told officers: “My father and mother had been having serious arguments for some time. My mother wanted a divorce, but my father strongly opposed it. After killing her, he ran away.”
Back in Mashhad, at 11:45 p.m. on August 26, two gunshots echoed on Haft Howz Road.
Inside a Peugeot, 41-year-old Vajiheh Rouzeh-Khan lay dead from a gunshot wound to the head. Beside her was the lifeless body of a 44-year-old man. Police found bullets and a pistol during their inspection of the car.
This was Vajiheh’s second marriage.
“She only agreed to marry again because of people’s gossip and to escape the gaze and harsh judgment faced by divorced women,” a source close to her told IranWire.
According to relatives, her second husband had repeatedly threatened to kill her, and the couple had nearly divorced several times.
“Some time before the tragedy, Vajiheh sought a divorce,” a relative said. “She went to forensic medicine and, after being severely beaten, obtained a medical certificate to support her case.”
Her husband constantly accused her of infidelity, though he had no proof. Ultimately, he killed her and then himself.
The case is now being handled by judicial and law enforcement authorities in Khorasan Razavi.
These four deaths in a single month underscore what human rights organizations have long documented: Iran lacks effective legal protections for women facing domestic violence.
The country still has no comprehensive domestic violence law. Women seeking divorce face significant legal and social barriers.
Iranian authorities do not publish reliable statistics on femicide, though some cases are occasionally covered in local media.
According to Etemad newspaper, 78 women were murdered by family members between March and September last year.
In 2023, Shargh newspaper reported that at least 165 women were killed by male relatives between 2021 and 2023, with 27 murders occurring in the first three months of 2023 alone, many linked to “honor killings.”
These are only reported cases; the true figures are believed to be significantly higher.
In June, IranWire also reported the release of the father of Donya Hosseini, who was fatally stabbed in February after requesting a divorce. He served only three months in prison.
Donya, who had three sisters - Shaghayegh, Rezvan, and Zahra - was murdered despite repeated threats from her father.
Under Article 301 of Iran’s Islamic Penal Code, fathers are exempt from retributive justice (qisas) for killing their children.
They are instead required to pay blood money and face discretionary punishment.
While a 2021 amendment allows courts to revoke parental rights and prohibits early release before a quarter of the sentence is served, enforcement remains inconsistent.
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