Yesterday Nazanin Afshin-Jam received an email from Mr. Mahmoud Latif asking if she could help bring worldwide attention to the injustice to his son Mohammad Latif who was sentenced to death at age 14 for defending himself from an 18 year old boy named Mansour Kayaee.

The news came as another surprise because Mohammad was not on SCE’s list of children facing execution. According to his father, Mohammad was 14 years 11 month and 23 days old when he was attacked by Mansour and accidentally killed the assailant while trying to take the knife away from him. His father is extremely worried about Mohammad who is now 17 years and 9 months, which could mean that they could execute him in three months when he turns 18 years old.
 
Mr. Latif has written to the head of Judiciary Ayatollah Shahroudi, the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and the head of the Majles (Iranian Parliament) asking for help, however he has not received any replies.
 
The Supreme Court has confirmed the conviction saying that it was an intentional act. In his letters Mohammad’s father has stated that even according to Islamic Sharia laws of Iran Mohammad was not at the legal age of puberty (15 for boys).
 
Through official papers, The Ministry of Health confirmed that at the time of incident,  Mohammad was not mentally considered an adult. Mr. Latif also has written confirmation from two Ayatollahs, Behjat and Makarem Shirazi, that if there was any doubt on the maturity of the convicted, they could not carry out the execution.
 
A separate examination was conducted a year after the incident which says that Mohammad was an adult because he was past the age of puberty and had hair on his body.
 
Nazanin Afshin-Jam spoke to Mr. Latif this morning, where he pleads with the international community to help save his son from execution.  He said that his son has already spent three years in prison. When Mohammad was first admitted to prison, his father described him as a healthy boy. After spending 10 months in an adult prison in Arak, he was moved to a prison in Saveh with more juvenile offenders. He now describes his son as having lost weight, weak, problems with his vision and very nervous psychologically.

Nazanin Afshin-Jam immediately contacted attorney Mr. Mostafaei to see if there was anything he or his legal team could do to help Mohammad. Mr. Mostafaei spoke with Mr. Latif and will be visiting Mohammad tomorrow in jail and take a look at his file and see if there is anything he can do to assist Mohammad’s current lawyer.

Nazanin also sent the documents and the information about Mohammad to Amnesty International. 

Stop Child Executions campaign urges you to take part in helping young Mohammad and the 73 other minors who are on death row in Iran. Please click on “how you can help”  to learn more about how you can take action.