Thousands watch as gang rapists are hanged
henk - 29.09.2002 20:44
Thousands watch as gang rapists are hanged
 http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=123&art_id=qw1033288204683E223&set_id=1
Thousands watch as gang rapists are hanged
September 29 2002 at 11:06AM
By Stefan Smith
Tehran - Residents of the Iranian capital were given a public display of revolutionary justice Sunday, with five convicted gang rapists executed by hanging at dawn.
The gang, dubbed the "black vultures" by police who tracked their spate of brutal rapes, were strung up from cranes before thousands of people, including the mother of at least one of them, at two different sites in Tehran.
With authorities keen to make an example of the gang, the local and foreign press were given full access to the spectacle, which involved the convicted rapists being slowly lifted off the back of trucks by the necks and suffering a slow death by strangulation.
"We were going to execute them in prison, but we were flooded with telephone calls from many women asking for us to hang them in public," a court official said.
The deaths took at least five minutes, and drew cheers and applause of "Allah u Akbar" (God is Greatest) from the spectators, many of whom had scaled lamp posts to get a better view.
At least 5 000 people held back by hundreds of riot police witnessed each of the hangings at Azadi Square in the west and Lavizan square in the east of the city.
The gang was convicted of carrying out a series of brutal assaults across the capital, coaxing young girls into parks before tying them up, robbing them of cash and jewellery and raping them.
Police put their number of victims at at least 10, but said it was probably more given the stigma involved in filing a rape complaint.
The gang members, all aged between 25 and 26, were also convicted of extortion. A sixth member of the gang was handed a 25-year jail term and flogging.
"Cases like this we do in public so it gives people a lesson," said Mohammad Erfan, the judge who handed out the convictions.
Riot police were out in force to keep the crowds under control, but the overall atmosphere was that of a carnival, with several traders out selling biscuits to the captivated audience.
Hundreds of people had started congregating for the events as early as 4am, seeking to beat the rush for a front-row view.
In Lavizan Square, where the crowd including hundreds of women and several young children, tear gas was used to disperse over-zealous onlookers as the cranes hoisted the convicts' bodies.
In the crowd there were a number of the gang's victims, and a hysterical mother who had turned up to watch her son die.
"If women were not so corrupt, my son would never have done this," said the woman, who only identified herself as the mother of convict Amir Farkhri.
Speaking to the press just minutes before they were led away for ablutions and then death, two of the convicts protested their innocence, but one accepted his guilt and appealed for forgiveness.
The two men executed at Azadi Square did not speak to journalists.
Iran imposes the death penalty for murder, armed robbery, rape, blasphemy and smuggling drugs if the quantity held is in excess of 5km of opium.
The result is a high rate of executions, many of them in public.
According to human rights watchdog Amnesty International, last year at least 139 people, including one minor, were executed.
The true figures may have been considerably higher, according to Amnesty. - Sapa-AFP
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