On this date in 2009, Mosleh Zamani was hanged in Iran for making the beast with two backs.
And you thought you’d seen sexual hangups.
Twenty-three at the time of his execution, Zamani was all of 17 years old when he committed the “crime” that earned him the rope.
That crime: abducting and raping a 24-year-old woman.
So, okay, one might say: pretty rough punishment but also pretty serious misbehavior.
Save for a few minor details. Like, that the “raped” woman was actually Zamani’s girlfriend. And that she said the sex was consensual. Apparently this testimony from the mere victim was superseded by three random village prudes willing to complain about what the licentious youth get up to these days.
Given his cruel treatment, it will not surprise that Zamani was an ethnic Kurd and that his legal representation fell somewhere between poor and nonexistent.
Persian speakers (I am not one) can take in this interview with the young man’s family.
On this day..
- 1668: Walter P(e)ake
- 1944: The massacres of Wereth and Malmedy, during the Battle of the Bulge
- 638: The garrison of Gaza, by their Muslim conquerors
- 1707: Jack (Sam) Hall, chimney sweep and robber
- 1591: Elisabeth von Doberschütz, Stettin witch
- 1954: Eugen Turcanu, torturer
- 1963: Russell Pascoe and Dennis Whitty, Britain's second-last hanging date
- 1708: Deborah Churchill, "common strumpet"
- 1883: Patrick O'Donnell, avenger
- 1818: Abdullah ibn Saud, last ruler of the first Saudi state
- 1182: Maria of Antioch
- 1927: Rajendra Lahiri