Tomaj Salehi, a singer and one of the Jina nationwide protests detainees was arrested again by the security forces in Babol and taken to an unknown location.
According to the Campaign for the Defense of Political and Civil Prisoners, Tomaj Salehi was arrested by the security forces in Babol and taken to an unknown location on Thursday, November 30th, 2023.
According to this report, the rap singer was arrested and assaulted by plainclothes officers in Babol without a court order.
Tomaj Salehi, imprisoned in Dastgerd (Central) prison in Isfahan province, after approving the request for retrial in Branch 39 of the Supreme Court and canceling the ruling of the first instance, until the final verdict by the appeals court of Isfahan province, was released on bail on Saturday, November 18th, 2023. He was previously sentenced to six years and three months in prison by Isfahan Revolutionary Court.
Amir Raisian, Tomaj Salehi’s defense lawyer, explained this news and said: “Following the appeal, Tomaj Salehi case was heard in the 39th branch of the Iran Supreme Court, and finally, due to the many objections to the original documents, some of these objections were accepted by the Supreme Court, and after rejecting the original ruling, the case was returned to Branch 1 of Isfahan Revolutionary Court.
He continued: “Also, the Supreme Court of the country considered Tomaj Salehi as other people who were subject to the circular of amnesty and announced that he can also use the amnesty.”
In conclusion, this lawyer stated that: ” Although Tomaj Salehi is included in the amnesty order and the case should have been closed without bail, but considering that some of the objections raised by the branch 39 Supreme Court should be reviewed, the first branch of the Isfahan Revolutionary Court decided to release Tomaj Salehi on bail for the time being.”
It should be noted that, the re-investigation session of Tomaj Salehi’s judicial case was held at the Isfahan Revolution Prosecutor’s Office through video conference on May 7th, 2023. On that session, Tomaj Salehi presented his defense to the investigator. Tomaj had second hearing by Branch 1 of the Isfahan Revolutionary Court with Amir Raisian representing him on July 2nd, 2023. Later in early July, he was sentenced to 6 years and 3 months imprisonment for the “corruption on earth” charge, but acquitted for the charges of “insulting the founder of the Islamic Republic”, “insulting the leadership” and “association with the hostile Nations”. As additional punishments, he was sentenced to be banned from leaving the country.
Also, on October 30th, 2022, Seyyed Mohammad Mousavian, the Isfahan province public and revolutionary prosecutor, announced that the reasons for the arrest of this music activist are “propaganda activity against the regime”, “collaboration with hostile governments” and “forming an illegal group with the intention of disrupting country security” and further claimed that “the accused played a key role in creating disturbances and inviting and encouraging the recent disturbances and riots in Isfahan province and in Shahin Shahr city”.
On October 30th, 2022, Tomaj Salehi was arrested by the security forces and transferred to the detention center of one of the security agencies in Isfahan province for interrogation and filing a case. After going through interrogation and then investigation, while he was deprived of the basic rights of a defendant to have access to the lawyer of his choice, and according to the referral of his case to the Revolutionary Court of Isfahan Province, he was present in the first session of his trial on November 26th, 2022. After explaining the charges, he was sent back to Isfahan prison.
After that, on December 29th, 2022, Amir Raisian, a lawyer, while announcing the acceptance of his request for representing Tomaj Salehi, explained the situation of his client: “We have sent our comments to the branch in the form of a legal bill. We also sent the opinions of the Guardian Council and the Legal Department of the Judiciary to the branch so that we would be allowed to announce our representation, which finally happened yesterday.”