Dissident Director Allegedly Killed by Iran’s Security Forces in Custody
Niloufar Goudarzi
Iran International
Dissident director and screenwriter Bahare Lelahi was allegedly killed by Iran’s security forces and buried in secret.
Iran International
Dissident director and screenwriter Bahare Lelahi was allegedly killed by Iran’s security forces and buried in secret.
Kazem Gharibabadi, the deputy of Iran's Judiciary for International Affairs denied the allegations against Nouri on Monday, describing the member of IRGC’s extraterritorial Quds Force as "defender of the shrine."
The Islamic Republic refers to its forces sent to Syria as defenders of the shrine of Zeynab, the sister of the third Shiite Imam. Nouri also holds Syrian citizenship , where he was known by his nom de guerre "Abu Abbas."
According to Iran International's sources, after the war in Syria, Nouri went to Iraq, where he used his connections to secure commercial contracts for companies affiliated with the IRGC. Nouri, along with a member of the Iraqi Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba militant group, pressured businesses into cooperation with the IRGC, threatening them that if they did not sign contracts, they would face repercussions from Nujaba. According to information obtained by Iran International, Nouri, was previously arrested in Iran on charges of espionage. Our sources did not provide further details about his prior conviction in Iran.
Gharibabadi claimed that Washington had requested his extradition, but Baghdad rejected it. Although the Islamic Republic and the Iraqi government have signed an extradition treaty, Iraq has so far also refused to transfer Nouri to Iran.
"Through legal and judicial efforts, the charges against Mohammadreza Nouri changed from terrorism-related offenses to other charges, creating the legal basis for his transfer to Iran," Gharibabadi said.
Nouri was arrested along with four Iraqi nationals for killing American national Stephen Troell in Baghdad. The five were sentenced to life in prison in September 2023. Nouri’s identity had not been released to the media at the time.
Troell, an English teacher, was shot dead by at least two gunmen while driving through Baghdad’s Karrada district in November 2022. According to a source cited by Reuters, the murder was orchestrated by Nouri, along with his Iraqi accomplices. Troell, a 45-year-old Tennessee native, worked at the Global English Institute, a school managed by his wife, Jocelyn. They had lived in Iraq’s capital along with their three daughters and a toddler son.
“It is critical that all those responsible for the brutal, premeditated assassination of Mr. Troell face justice and accountability,” said State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller in a statement after the verdict was issued. “We welcome the Iraqi court’s decision to convict and sentence multiple individuals on terrorism charges for their roles in the killing of US citizen Stephen Troell.”
Citing a judicial source, AFP said that the five confessed to the murder, noting that they had intended to kidnap Troell for ransom. Karrada was also the site of the kidnapping of Elizabeth Tsurkov, an Israeli-Russian abducted by Iran-backed militant group Kata'ib Hezbollah last June. Tsurkov was a graduate student at Princeton University conducting research in Iraq.
According to Al Arabiya, a militant group called Ashab al-Kahf, (Companions of the Cave) claimed responsibility for Troell’s assassination, saying that it was a retaliation for the targeted killing of IRGC-Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the commander of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), by the United States in 2020.
Nouri’s case made news in Iran in May, when late Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian met with his wife and father, emphasizing that efforts are underway for his release.
A source close to her family informed Iran International that security forces demanded money to disclose her burial location and ordered them to keep her death private.
While the exact circumstances surrounding her death remain unclear, human rights activists believe it is a state-backed killing based on the actions of state agents, such as the cover-up and secret burial.
Lelahi, 40, who was briefly detained during the 2022 nationwide protest, went missing in March 2023. In September 2022, the death in police custody of Mahsa Amini, which the UN’s fact-finding mission pinned on state authorities, ignited nationwide demonstrations, during which more than 550 protesters were killed.
Dissident journalist Masih Alinejad wrote on Instagram: “After extensive inquiries, her family was informed through the police that Lelahi had died and was interred at Bibi Sakineh Cemetery in Karaj, near Tehran.
“Despite having killed Bahareh and inscribing her name on the burial site, authorities withheld this information from her family for three months.”
The online Institute for Iranian Civil Society (Tavaana) also cited sources close to her family claiming they are trying to bring her body back to their hometown of Amol, in northern Iran, to bury her.
Tavaana also reported that security forces are summoning citizens via phone. When individuals comply without informing anyone, they can be held with no legal representation and nobody has knowledge of their whereabouts.
Amnesty International has highlighted the Iranian authorities have failed to provide accountability for tens of deaths in custody, despite credible reports that they resulted from torture or other ill-treatment or the lethal use of firearms and tear gas by officials when rounding up protestors.
Judiciary officials, who have consistently denied international investigations into Iranian prisons and detention centers, assert that conditions in these facilities are adequate. However, the experiences of numerous prisoners shared by rights groups reveal that prisons and detention centers operated by security forces have effectively become "killing grounds," particularly for dissidents.
