Atefah Sahaaleh

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Atefeh Sahaaleh, aged 16 years

Atefeh Rajabi Sahaaleh (1988 - August 15, 2004) was a 16-year-old Iranian girl who was executed in Iran after being sentenced to death by an Iranian judge, Haji Rezai, for allegedly having committed "acts incompatible with chastity": Based on judicial records, by the time Atefeh was 16, she had been convicted five times of having sex with unmarried men^[1] , and for removing her hijab while arguing with her judge in court.

According to the BBC, supreme court of Appeal documents described her as a 22-year-old, but no one bothered to check her real age. Her trial for ‘crimes against chastity’ was based on her admission that she had been repeatedly raped by a 51-year-old ex-revolutionary guard turned taxi driver, Ali Darabi, a married man with children.

Atefeh reportedly had no access to legal counsel and her death sentence was upheld by a Supreme Court of conservative mullahs. Haji Rezaii, the religious judge, was reportedly so incensed with Atefeh’s "sharp tongue" during the trial that he travelled to Tehran to convince the mullahs of the Supreme Court to uphold the death sentence. According to Amnesty International, it was reported that she suffered from psychological illness, both during the trials and at the time she committed the crime. She was publicly hanged from a crane in Neka, Iran, in August 2004, the noose being applied by the lower court judge himself. Amnesty International, as well as human rights organizations from the international community at large, declared her killing to be a crime against humanity and against children of the world.^[2]

[edit] BBC Undercover - "Execution of a Teenage Girl"

The case of Atefeh Sahaaleh is the subject of a BBC documentary made by Wild Pictures. Director, Monica Garnsey and Associate Producer, Arash Sahami went undercover to document the case ^[3] It is also the subject of an hour-long Discovery Times program called "Execution in Iran."