Testimony of Kurosh Hedayatnejad
I am Kurosh Hedayatnejad. I am 17. I was born on September 8, 2006, in Isfahan. I am a student, and I am currently in the tenth grade, Natural Sciences track. My father is a retired army officer, and my mother is a homemaker.
Ever since the beginning of protests in Iran, I wrote slogans on walls. The only thing I could do was to write slogans on walls. The reason I participated in the protests in this way was that my family members would go to demonstrations, but since I was too young, they would not take me with them. That was why I decided to secretly go out and write slogans on walls. I was unhappy with the situation in my country, and I wanted to participate in getting the freedom we all wanted. That’s why I started writing slogans on walls. Sometimes I would not go to school, and I would go slogan writing. At some point the principal informed my mom that I was absent sometimes. When my mom asked me why I was absent, I didn’t tell her about the slogan writing, and I just said I was not happy with the subjects I was studying. After that, I would leave the house on the pretext of going to the gym, and instead I would go slogan writing.
One day I asked one of my friends to go slogan writing with me and he accepted. We planned to go the next day. It was Wednesday, November 29, 2022. I told my mother I was going to the gym, but instead my friend and I went to write slogans on walls. I left the house at about 5 pm. We went onto a side street near Modarres street in Isfahan. It was about 6 or 7 pm when I started to write. My friend said, “Do you want me to film you so that we can send it to news networks and get more coverage?” I said, “Why not. Go ahead and film.” He started filming and I wrote the slogan. I wrote, “Death to the Dictator”. When I went to write another slogan by the first one, I noticed a group of motorcycle riders in plain clothes entered the side street. They had night sticks in hand, and I felt they were going to attack us. Before I had a chance to react, they sprayed pepper spray in my face. My face was burning badly, so much that my mind went blank. I didn’t know what to do. I started to run away. While I was running, my cell phone started to ring. I answered quickly and I said they are chasing me, they are going to get me. Right then, I heard the gunshot. When I heard the gunshot, I realized they have weapons, and I thought they were going to shoot at me. I stopped running, thinking they would arrest me, and they would not shoot at me. One of them came and pushed me from the back, so that I fell and hit my head on the pavement by the park. There was a small park. As I was on the ground, they started beating me. I couldn’t tell how many of them there were. They were beating me from all directions with night sticks, feet, etc. I was holding my head so that my head would not be hit. They picked me up, put handcuffs on me and pulled a keffiyeh over my head. When they were beating me, I had wet myself. When they picked me up and noticed that I had wet myself, they resumed beating me and making fun of me, saying demeaning things like, “Why did you make yourself unclean, you idiot?”
They took me towards their motorcycles. They wanted to take me on their motorcycles. At first, I resisted getting on, because I knew if I got on the motorcycle, nothing good would come of it. But when they tased my leg, it went limp, I couldn’t resist anymore, and they put me on the motorcycle.
All along the way, they asked me, “Who do you work for? How much did you get paid?”, or other questions like how old I was, where I lived, etc. He asked me “How many siblings do you have?” When I said I had three sisters, he started cursing, “I will violate your sisters. I will violate your mom too.” Or he would say, “Don’t worry about going to prison, we will keep your mom company.” They were constantly cursing and humiliating me. If they didn’t like my answers they tormented me in different ways. They cursed me and beat me on the motorcycle. For instance, he asked me, “Why did you write slogans?” I said, “For Woman, Life, Freedom” and I added, “Writing slogans is my right. I haven’t done anything bad.” Suddenly the motorcycle picked up speed, and something hit my legs. I didn’t know what it was. Some kind of bar. When I was moaning and shouting from the pain, he said, “Aww, are you bothered kid? Are you hurting?” and he tormented me.
Eventually, after about 20 minutes, they took me down from the motorcycle. My face was covered by a keffiyeh and I couldn’t see anything. They told me “The door is open, go through here.” As I was going through, my head hit an iron door, and they started to laugh and ridicule me. We entered a space, but they didn’t let me sit down. They told me I had wet myself and I was unclean. Some time passed. My eyes were closed. I don’t know what happened there. After a while they took me to another place. It was completely quiet. Someone came to me and said, “What have you done and why are you here?” I said all I did was to write a slogan. He kicked me hard in the stomach with his knee. I doubled over from the pain and held my stomach. He shouted, “Take him out of here. We don’t have room.” They said, “Yes sir” and took me out of there. Some time passed. They had made me to kneel. They took the keffiyeh off my face. Even though my eyes were burning and I couldn’t see very well, I tried to look around me and to see what was going on. I saw three other people a few meters across from me, kneeling like myself.
Someone was standing over them. He had something in his hand, and he was holding it to the first person’s head. I couldn’t see well, because my eyes were still burning from the pepper spray. He asked the first person, “Are you sorry or not?” He answered, “No. I’m not sorry and I will do it again.” At that moment I heard a gunshot. I was really frightened and I started to cry. I was crying so much that I didn’t know what happened next. I just heard two more shots. While I was crying, I felt someone came close to me and put something on my head. Something like the barrel of a gun. He said, “It’s your turn.” I was sure he was going to shoot me and that I was going to die. I was so frightened that I wet myself again. Then someone came and asked this person, “What are you doing?” He answered, “Nothing sir. I’m not doing anything. I’m getting him ready.” He picked me up and put the keffiyeh back on my face and took me to the motorcycle. They took me by motorcycle to a place that I later found out was police precinct 35 in Imam Square.
Since I had been pepper sprayed at the very beginning, there was a keffiyeh on my face most of the time, and they were of course wearing masks, I couldn’t see them very much. Later, I heard that at the police station my family members had been told that since the people arresting me were plain clothesmen, they couldn’t let me go.
Sexual Molestation
When we got to the police station, they took me to a corner and left me facing a wall, so that I couldn’t see anything. My hands were still cuffed but they had taken the keffiyeh off my face. I felt someone touching my behind. I thought I saw him touching himself with his other hand, and then he put his hand into my pants. I wet myself again… When he noticed I was wet, he took his hand out because I was unclean… [At this point the interviewee started crying and the interviewer changed the subject]
Interrogation at Police Station 35 Imam Khomeini
After that happened, I noticed some people talking around me. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but I was sure they were talking about me. I was still facing the wall. When they turned me around, I saw that there were several people. Two people were plain clothesmen, and one was a police officer. The police officer was holding my cell phone, and he was checking it. He came near me, showed me pictures of my family members, and asked me who they were. Then he went into my Instagram and checked my messages. He saw my sister’s Stories where she had posted protest material. He focused a lot on that. He asked, “Who is this?” I said it’s my sister. They turned me towards the wall again. After a while they sat me down on a dirty ledge. Up until then they wouldn’t let me sit down because I was unclean. After that, two men came in. One of them put a plastic chair in front of me and sat down. He started to question me. The other guy was standing, playing with his keffiyeh. When the man asked me questions, if I lifted my head to look at him and answer, the other guy would say, “Keep your head down. Why are you looking?” If I wasn’t paying attention, he would kick me. If I said something that wouldn’t make sense, that guy would hit me hard on my leg with that keffiyeh, and he would say, “Listen to what he says and answer correctly.” The questions were mostly, “Where did you write slogans? How many slogans did you write? How many sisters do you have? What are your sisters’ names? What are your parents’ names and where do they live?” He also asked me about the spray paint. He asked me where I had bought it, and who had been with me at the time. I pretty much answered all their questions.
The first time they asked me on the motorcycle, “Why did you write slogans?”, I said:” for Woman, Life, Freedom”. Later, I thought about it, and when they asked again, I would say things like “I was misled by the media, I made a bad mistake, I’m really sorry.” I thought I could skirt the issue this way. I knew if I said anything else, they would beat me for sure. After he had asked all the questions, he put the paper he was writing on in front of me and said, “Sign it.” I didn’t really see what it was. They wouldn’t let me see it properly. They were slapping my head, and they were telling me to keep my head down. They told me to sign three places, and they forced me to sign the paper. Then they left and told me to sit and wait.
The atmosphere in the police station was such that whenever you made a mistake, you might have gotten beaten up. All the time, they were interrogating. Or they would walk around the station, and occasionally, they would beat you. Most of their questions were repeated. For instance, one question they asked a lot was, “Why did you write slogans on walls?” They beat me with nightsticks, kicked me, and tased my leg. They slapped my face. When I looked in their faces, they would slap the side of my head and tell me to lower my head. For instance, when he would say, “Put your hands behind your back,” and he wanted to put handcuffs on, if I didn’t, or if I didn’t do it fast enough, he would kick or punch or hit me with the night stick. All that time, if I made a mistake, they would beat me. They even beat me for fun.
It got dark. About 9 pm, I heard sounds that I recognized as my family. My mother, sister, and father had come. An officer came to get me. He pulled me to my feet, and they allowed me to see my family for a minute. My sister and my mother kissed me. My mother begged them to go easy on me and to let me go.
After that, that same night, they took me to the judge on night duty at the court on Nikbakht Street. The judge looked at me and asked me the same questions. Why did you write slogans? Who do you work for? How much did you get paid? I answered the questions. Then he told me to wait outside while he spoke to the officer in charge. It took about half an hour. Then he issued an arrest warrant for me, and they returned me to police station 35. This whole time, my family were standing outside the court, but they were not allowed in.
When they took me back to police station 35, they didn’t take me to a cell. They just handcuffed me to a central heating radiator and left me there until morning. In the morning a new group came to work. A middle-aged man was putting on his uniform and fiddling with some papers. He saw me and asked, “Why are you here?” I said I had written slogans on walls. He said, “You wrote slogans? They will hang you!” When he said ‘hang’, I got very upset, and I started crying, wondering why they would hang me for writing a few slogans? After a while, they came and took me to court. All this time, they did not give me any food. They did give me water.
I don’t remember what time it was, but in the morning, they took me to a different judge. This one was the assistant prosecutor’s office, branch 42, on Eshraq Street. I don’t know his name. He was middle-aged. He wasn’t overweight. He was medium, and he wore glasses.
My family were also there. They bothered us a lot. They didn’t let my family members talk to the judge. This judge was much more bad-tempered. He was kind of middle-aged. He asked me the same questions all over again. During this court proceeding there was nobody else present except myself and the officer who had brought me in handcuffs from the police station and was guarding me so I wouldn’t escape. The judge told me, “You wrote Death to the Dictator. You have insulted the Leader. How can I not be sentenced to be hanged?” I was very distressed. I thought it was over and that he was sentencing me to execution by hanging. He kept saying I would have to stay in prison until Saturday, when I would be taken to court again. Finally, just ten minutes before the court was going to be closed for the day, he released me on bail. My parents begged and pleaded and surrendered my father’s pay warrant as collateral.
Mental and physical problems after release
I was released on November 30, 2022. After I was released, I had physical and mental problems. My mother took me to different doctors. I continued to have problems. I couldn’t sleep at night. I had a fever and chills. I kept having nightmares. I still have nightmares (a year after those events). My physical problems were caused by the night stick beatings to my arms and to my head. My arms and legs were bruised. The spray they had used on my face had caused burns. My head had also been beaten several times.
Searching the home, confiscation of personal items, and religious consultation
After a while, I felt a little better and I was able to return to school. One day, when I came home from school, I saw the house was ransacked, and my mother was clutching her heart and was in bad shape. I asked my sister what had happened? Why was the house turned upside down? She said four men had come into the house. They had searched everywhere, and they had taken away things like cell phones and laptops.
After that, they set an appointment for me to go to counseling before my court appearance. They said it is part of the court proceedings. On February 10, 2023, we went to the assistant prosecutor’s office on Eshraq Street. The counseling was done by a mulla. The mulla asked me a bunch of questions that had nothing to do with slogan writing. For instance, he asked, “How is your relationship with your family? Do you have arguments or not?” He also asked some questions about my religious beliefs. For instance, “Who is the first Imam? Do you pray or not?” Then he wrote something and sent it to the court. I don’t remember his name. He was tall, about 6’2”. He had a beard, but his beard was not white. It had some white, but it wasn’t completely white.
After that, in June 2023, I received a summons to appear in Branch 1 of the Revolutionary Court of Isfahan, on July 9, 2023. My family and I decided not to go to court. I really did not want to experience those spaces again. That was why one day before that court date, my sister and I left the country. From when we left the country until now (November 2023), they have called my father twice and they have said I have to go to court, otherwise things will turn out badly for me. One time they called the house phone and requested my sister to appear at the Security Office.
Additional information from interview with the sister of Kurosh Hedayatnejad
Noushin Kamalian, the sister of Kurosh Hedayatnejad, declares that after Kurosh was arrested and before his appearance in court, they were forced to quickly leave Iran. She says they decided to do this because they were afraid he would be barred from leaving the country. Also, they were seriously worried about his fate if he had appeared in court and if he had been arrested again.
Concerning the condition of Kurosh, Ms. Kamalian says although the physical damage and the bruising from beatings gradually healed after a few weeks, and examinations of his brain and nervous system do not show permanent physical damage, his mental state is critical. She stresses that her brother has had a mental breakdown. The smallest stimulus causes him to shiver and to cry. He has regressed severely in schoolwork. Psychologists report that he is in bad mental shape. This is evidenced by the fact that due to the shock from the abuses he endured, Kurosh can still not talk about the details of his torture and of the things that happened to him.
Ms. Kamalian says that even after they left the country, legal pressures have continued. The father of the family has received several phone calls about Kurosh being summoned to court, and he himself has summoned on the phone. Also, personal effects such as laptops, cameras, and cell phones that had been confiscated during the search of their home have yet to be returned. According to the latest summons, delivered to their door, the case of Kurosh has been sent from the Revolutionary Court of Isfahan to the Juvenile Court, since he is under 18, and he has been given 5 days to tell the court the name of his lawyer.
At the time of this interview, although they have left the country, this family was living in very difficult circumstances. Ms. Kamalian complains about lack of security, financial problems, and unclear residency status. She says the relevant officials in the country where they live have not accepted their request for refugee status. They use legal loopholes, such as questioning her guardianship of her brother, to give them the official runaround.
She describes their life as “in limbo”, and she says that since they do not have official papers, her brother is deprived of the right to education and to health services. Also, fear of being arrested by the local police and of being deported to Iran has caused them to stay at home for fear of their lives, in complete isolation and constant stress.