Hope and despair, together, are intertwined in Karaj’s Qezel Hessar prison – one of the largest prisons in the Middle East – despite thousands of prisoners under death sentences. It has been a few months since prisoners have heard whispers that the current laws regarding issuing death sentences for drug-related crimes may change; on one hand, they are more hopeful than ever before, counting down the days until nightfall, and on the other hand, they say, “If we’re lucky, this law will be implemented just one day after our execution!”

“When talking to a prisoner under a death sentence, who has been struggling with the feeling of death for the past four years, the most mysterious concept that humanity has been grappling with, above all else, raises two questions in the mind: “If executions for drug offenses were removed from the law, what should be said to those who have already been executed and their families?” And of course, what feeling can an executioner have when they feel the tightness of the noose around their neck, and fundamentally, in those initial moments when the execution is carried out, is the mind capable of thinking and understanding, and when exactly will this process come to a halt?”

Benjamin, in his translation of Antoine Vertes’ Three Lettres, writes about the French artist’s subtitles: “First minute: On the scaffold; the responses are as follows: the sound of the guillotine coming down, a muffled murmur in his head. The criminal thinks, not of the blade, but of the thunder that has struck him. In a surprising way, his head has fallen here, under the scaffold, and yet he still thinks it is up there, still considers himself a part of his body, and is still waiting for the blow that will separate him. -A terrifying suffocation.- Breathing is impossible. It comes from an otherworldly and inhuman hand that lifts him up towards his head and neck like a mountain. Where does this inhuman hand come from? The suffering man understands that his fingers are purple and feel like thorns…”

The upcoming conversation is with a young man who was born in 1356 (1977) in a large family in the city of Rey. He studied up to the pre-university level in the field of metallurgy and is currently sentenced to death for drug-related crimes and is serving his sentence in Karaj’s Qazalhesar prison. His name, at his own request, remains confidential with “Khat-e-Solh” (Peace Line).

As the first question, please tell us when were you arrested and what was the accusation that led to your recognition as a criminal and sentenced to execution?

My accusation was related to crystal meth. However, they found nothing when I was arrested, neither at home nor in my car, and I had no suspicious financial transactions or contacts that could indicate this crime. But the interesting and peculiar issue in my case was that initially it was mentioned that 490 grams of crystal meth – as they claimed – had been discovered, and this amount was also mentioned in my case, but later it reached 18 kilograms! The reason for this was that I have a joint case with 6 other people and all the discoveries from the 7 of us, which amounted to 18 kilograms, were accounted for individually; because the judge ruled that we had collaborated with each other. Of course, the 18 kilograms that I am presenting to you, 10 kilograms of it is related to raw materials that were discovered in the laboratory of a person whom I do not even know and is a fugitive, and it had not yet been converted into crystal meth, but they

From October 2011, when I went to Karaj to visit the mother of one of my friends, I was arrested and transferred to Karaj’s interrogation center at the house of one of my relatives. There, my unconditional release letter was written (at that time, the discussion was about 490 grams of glass, and of course, as I mentioned, they did not take anything from me), but the Tehran Anti-Drug Headquarters prevented my release and after being transferred to Tehran, everything turned around and I was unjustly sentenced to death.

Me and another one of my files were under interrogation at the Tehran Drug Control Headquarters for about 22 days. After the first person was interrogated, they didn’t listen to the rest of us and for 17 days we were only under torture; in an underground room with six steps down, in a room, handcuffed and shackled to a chair, and only getting beaten. Considering that I was also blindfolded, I swear on my daughter’s life, I don’t know what text I signed and under the beatings, I was forced to do it. Even on the day of my trial, I told the judge that I had signed papers under torture and I do not accept those accusations and words – whatever they may be and under my name – and now, in front of you, I want to tell the truth; but he said no, those are correct and your words today are not evidence for us and I will sentence you based on those!

After 22 days of being in the Tehran Drug Control Headquarters, were you transferred to the same Qezel Hessar prison?

No, for a while they took us to Kahrizak… An interesting issue that came to my mind and I need to tell you is that: When I was at the Drug Control Headquarters in Tehran, the interrogator who was questioning me and wrote an execution order for us and sent our case to the Revolutionary Court, is now in prison himself for fraud. I don’t know if in other countries, if an interrogator is found to be a criminal, is their execution order still valid and remains in effect? Does such a person have the authority to write an execution order for others?

This is a picture of a beautiful sunset.
Minister of Health’s Visit to Qazal Hasar Prison – Photo by ISNA

In which branch were you sentenced to execution and by which judge? And did you have the right to access a lawyer?

Branch 11 of the Revolutionary Court of Tehran, under the leadership of Judge Sadeghi, issued a death sentence for me and the rest of my cases in a 10-minute session. It has been about a year since we have been waiting for the prosecutor’s confirmation, but we have not received any response yet…

See, in drug crimes, a lawyer doesn’t really mean anything. During the arrest, interrogations and investigations, there is no lawyer present. For more than two months, I had no contact with the outside world and none of my family members knew anything about my situation or whether I was dead or alive; now a lawyer is needed. After that, only on the day of the trial, a court-appointed lawyer, whom I had never seen before and didn’t even know their name, was assigned to us. It was purely for formality and to say that I had a lawyer!

Did you later, in fact, seek a non-custodial lawyer or appeal your sentence between the initial court date and the appeal?

Protesting against the verdict in drug crimes only delays the execution of the sentence. In fact, the judge dislikes this and resists it! Let me tell you this: in revolutionary courts, everything is in their hands and there is no need for reason or evidence. They form the case themselves; whether it is based on reality or not, or whether you accept the charges or not, the judge only asks a few questions on the day of the trial and whatever answer you give, he says my knowledge determines whether you are guilty or not!

A lawyer cannot say anything special in front of the ruler and they tell him to just write your bill and leave it on the file… They always tell us that God is great; in fact, they always refer to the dimensions of God! Now I’m not denying these issues, but the problem is that in this country there is neither law nor justice…

Which branches of the Revolutionary Court usually issue death sentences for prisoners held in Qezel Hessar prison?

Branch 30, Judge Tayrani, Branch 28, Judge Moghiseh, Branch 1, Judge Ahmadzadeh, Branch 15, Judge Salavati, Branch 11, Judge Sadeghi, and if I’m not mistaken, Branch 29, Judge Modir Qomi, who issues most of the death sentences related to drug offenses.

Let me also mention that during these four years that I was in prison, believe it or not, I witnessed more than two thousand executions. However, sentence commutations were very rare and usually only applied to cases with, for example, 10 grams of drugs involved.

Have you had any previous arrests?

Until before this incident, not only did I not have a history of never going to a police station or station in my life, but even when they went for local investigations, all the locals had praised me, but I don’t know why they didn’t pay attention…

As I mentioned before, there is no evidence that I have taken, moved, bought, sold, or kept any materials in my file.

What is your marital status and are your parents still alive?

I am married and have a 14-year-old daughter. My parents are also…[sighs], yes, they are still alive but my mother had a stroke after this incident. In the beginning, she came to visit me a few times but after the stroke, she became bedridden and can no longer come to visit.

My spouse is also a tenant… In these four years, I have lost my entire life.

How do you feel about life currently and after facing the death sentence?

Outside of the prison, we were running from morning until night, and in the end, we were all exhausted. In reality, we were just barely alive. With this situation that has happened, in a few more days, even this breath will be taken from us. Life for me [pauses for a moment]… there is nothing… it is a slow death…

If this situation that I am in is supposed to continue, and they say tomorrow morning is the time for execution, I swear I will go with open arms. God forbid, I even kiss the hands of the one who puts the noose around my neck. I go so that firstly, this miserable life that I have will end, and secondly, my family will be at ease; my parents won’t have so much worry, my wife and children won’t have so much stress… My wife will be at ease and able to live her life without being a prisoner to me. My daughter, who is being bullied by her classmates and told that her father is in prison, will be at ease and won’t be embarrassed by her friends anymore; because there won’t be a father anymore. My mother will be at ease and won’t have nightmares every night when she hears about other families being executed, knowing that one of them was killed here. If they kill me, besides myself, this

In short, dying is better than this life.

Of course, let me also say that I don’t understand how in a situation where so many people are supposedly working to improve the country and eliminate drugs from society, there is such easy access to drugs within the prison walls! How can a government that can’t even stop drugs from entering a prison expect to stop it in the whole society? Is the solution to just kill us? Outside of prison, you have to at least walk a street or alley to get drugs, but here, in prison, it’s available in every room. For example, if you want to make cream in prison, it’s much harder and you have to go to several rooms to get the ingredients.

Can you tell us your best and worst memories of your life?

My best memory of life is related to the birth of my daughter. When the nurse came and told me that I had given birth to a healthy baby girl, and as I looked at my baby who had just been dressed in her clothes, I was so overwhelmed with happiness that I unconsciously kissed the nurse in the middle of the hospital! [Laughs] Of course, later I apologized to her and told her that she reminded me of my sister and I gave her my blessings as well…

But the worst memory of my life was when, after two months, my daughter and wife came to visit me for the first time at the Kahrizak detention center and were crying. That day, I begged the officers and asked them to let me hug my daughter, but they didn’t allow it and we could only talk to each other through a glass partition…

When one of your friends or colleagues asks you to carry out a task, how does it make you feel? What is the atmosphere like and what do you do in those moments?

I hope nothing bad happens to anyone, but life in such conditions makes everything gradually become normal for a normal person. A person realizes that death is not just for the neighbor; today they take away your friend or companion, tomorrow it might be your turn… The most we can do is to, for example, talk to them a little bit.

A few days ago, we had a performance. It was 5:30 in the morning when the kids woke me up. I asked what was going on and they said they were taking a few people for the performance. I got up and went to the hall. I saw the people they were taking for the performance sitting there. One of them was Mr. “Masoum Ali”. I sat next to him and kissed his hand. I was so moved that I didn’t know what to say to him… I said, “God willing, you’ll come back!” I knew with this statement, we were only fooling ourselves, but I had to give him some comfort. He took my hand; it was so cold that I was shocked. He told me he wished he had died on the first day, not after 8 years of being in prison and all the suffering that he and his wife and children went through, and now they were going to carry out his sentence.

If you have any specific comments or points at the end, please do share…

They say here that if you memorize the Quran, you will receive a discount in your punishment. One of our friends, who had his sentence carried out just two months ago, had memorized six parts of the Quran during that time, only because he had a daughter whom he dearly wanted to see before his execution. Just a few minutes before he was executed, he told the prison guard that he had memorized this much of the Quran in the past two months, and now that they were going to take him and kill him, what would happen to the Quran that he had memorized? They told him that it didn’t matter, that with this act, his sins had been forgiven and he would go to heaven. It means that even in prison, they determine the ways to reach heaven and hell, and they even talk about the levels of heaven!

Unfortunately, everything here is just like the situation I described for you, it’s ridiculous and there’s no one to hear our voice and help us. We’re stuck here and our hands are tied, we can only wait for death…

Thank you for accepting our conversation…

“Vertz, Antoine: Fragmented Thoughts and Imaginations, Walter Benjamin, translated by Golnar Narimani, Impossible.”