Fortune-teller is executed in Iran after being convicted of raping female clients

Iranian authorities have executed a male fortune-teller for raping and sexually assaulting several of his clients. 

The man, who was named in Iranian media as Ramali, ‘assaulted and raped women and girls under false pretences in several cases’ by using his services to trick them. He was executed at Yazd central prison, which lies in the centre of the country. 

He was arrested at some point between March 2020 and March 2021. His request for amnesty was rejected because of ‘the number of complaints’ against him.

Hossein Tahmasebi, chief justice of the central province, said:

‘The sentence of this rapist fortune-teller was carried out after being issued by the Revolutionary Court of Yazd and confirmed by the supreme judicial authority’.

Capital punishment is now officially outlawed in more than 50 per cent of nations, and 32 more territories have de-facto terminated its use, according to Amnesty International.

He was executed at Yazd central prison (Pictured) 

But the Islamic Republic of Iran is one of few countries fighting against this trend, maintaining the death penalty for several crimes, including rape and sexual assault.

In July 2023, Iran executed three men after they were convicted of raping women they had lured to a fake cosmetic surgery clinic and injected with anaesthetic drugs.

They were found guilty of conspiring in 12 cases of sexual assault in late 2021 in the southern province of Hormozgan.

Iran executes more people per year than any other nation except China, according to human rights groups including Amnesty.

It generally carries out executions by hanging.

Iran has for years been among the worst offenders for state-sanctioned killings, alongside the likes of China, Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

But the Iranian regime has gained a reputation for its indiscriminate executions and is now killing more of its citizens per capita than any other country.

Iran executed a ‘staggering’ total of at least 834 people last year, the highest number since 2015 as capital punishment surged in the Islamic Republic, two rights groups revealed this week.

The number of executions was up some 43 per cent on 2022, and marked only the second time in two decades that more than 800 executions were recorded in a year, Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHR) and Paris-based Together Against the Death Penalty said in a joint report.

The same report also indicated that at least 22 women were executed, marking the highest number in the past decade.