The open account of Amir Shahidi, the father of Mehrshad Shahidi, regarding the process of handling the complaint against those responsible for his son's death.

The hearing for the charges of intentional assault and quasi-intentional murder will be held on the 30th of Ordibehesht. Despite the judge's order, an anonymous authority has prevented the review of the case. Addressing quasi-intentional murder without a definitive order to dismiss the charge of intentional murder lacks legal weight and is outside judicial procedures.

Etemad: Amir Shahidi, the father of Mehrshad Shahidi, a 20-year-old student who lost his life during the protests on November 4, 2022, in an open account that he provided to "Etemad", described the process of the court examining the family's complaint against the assailants of his son, sharing details of this process. The highlighted sections of this account are as follows;

On the day of the incident, November 4th, around 10 PM, we received a call from the restaurant that Mehrshad had not returned to his workplace. Given the widespread public protests, we immediately began searching for him.

After extensive searching and identifying Mehrshad Azizi in the morgue of Arak cemetery, we were taken to the intelligence office where many questions were asked of us, to all of which we provided written answers. In the end, we filed a petition for justice and submitted a request for the restoration of our rights and those of Mehrshad Azizi.

After several months of follow-up and lack of a proper response, based on a friend's suggestion, we prepared another complaint and sent it through legal offices on January 21, 2023, to be addressed by the investigating judge of the case.

Investigations have continued for a long time and outside the norm in the first branch of an inquiry, and the lawyer of the case has submitted a request under a bill titled "Accelerating the Investigation Process" dated April 23, 2023, asking to reduce the investigation timeline and expedite the matter. The aforementioned bill has been recorded in the indicator office of the first branch of the inquiry (Special Murder) of the General and Revolutionary Prosecutor's Office of Arak County and has been appended to the case file.

On the date of 22 Mehr 1403 (October 14, 2024), a notification was sent to me by the first branch of the investigative office for the purpose of studying the case. Upon learning of this, I, along with my esteemed lawyers, visited the investigative branch on 25 Mehr 1403 (October 17, 2024) and requested to study the case file. The investigating judge responded to us that due to the security nature of the case and the fact that it involved charges against security, the complainants' lawyers must be approved lawyers of the judiciary and in accordance with Note 48 of the Code of Criminal Procedure!

Even now, the investigating judge has taken a strange action by issuing a notice without an attachment to me on February 2, 2025, to issue a final decree. When I went to the branch and studied the text of the decree, I realized that a decision to dismiss the prosecution had been issued regarding the charge of intentional murder. Since neither I nor my lawyers were allowed to review the case file, it has not been possible to appeal this decision, and I have been prevented from asserting my legal rights.

However, unfortunately, the branch one of the Criminal Court of Markazi Province, while raising objections to the status of the lawyers whose power of attorney has been registered and attached to the case from the beginning, rejected the mentioned objection without addressing the request for case review, and now has provided grounds for the infringement of the rights of myself and my spouse as the heirs. The question here is, assuming for the sake of argument that the lawyers lacked status, whose objection did the Criminal Court of Arak examine?

Subsequently, a notice was issued for the session of the 103rd Criminal Court II to address the charges of intentional assault and semi-intentional murder for the date of May 19, 2025. However, when I, along with the lawyers, arrived to study the case file, despite the judge's order to review the case, access to study it was prevented by an anonymous authority. Therefore, it was decided that due to the inability to study the file and the lack of adherence to law and justice, as well as the inability of the lawyers to defend without knowledge of the contents of the file, and on the other hand, considering that the decision to discontinue prosecution has not yet become final and the opportunity for appeals is still available.

Therefore, addressing the crime of involuntary manslaughter without the certainty of a decision to dismiss the charge of voluntary manslaughter lacks legal weight and is outside the procedures and judicial processes. As a result, I will not participate in the hearing, and the case attorneys will also be unable to defend, and participating in such a session will contradict all fundamental legal and judicial principles.