Homayoun Shabankar, 22-year-old January protester, sentenced to death in Karaj

Branch 2 of the Karaj Revolutionary Court has sentenced Homayoun Shabankar, a 22-year-old artist, animal rights activist and protester in the January uprising, to death. News of the verdict was published on Monday, 19 October 2026.

Homayoun Shabankar was born on 27 February 2004 and is single. The charge the Islamic Republic's judiciary has brought against him is "espionage", and, according to the information published about the case, its only basis is that he sent images of areas damaged during the war. He has rejected the charge.

Months in solitary confinement and a hunger strike

According to the published information, after raiding and searching Homayoun Shabankar's family home, security agents confiscated his laptop and personal belongings. He was held for more than 90 days in solitary confinement in Karaj Central Prison and was returned to solitary again from 30 August to 30 September 2026. During this period Shabankar was on hunger strike for 18 days, first a wet hunger strike and then a dry one.

Long periods in solitary confinement, the seizure of personal belongings and the construction of an "espionage" case out of photos and videos form a pattern that has been repeated many times in the cases of January protesters in the months since the war. The Tehran Revolutionary Court had earlier sentenced Alireza Malekzadeh to 15 years in prison for sending images and coordinates of locations.

A wave of death sentences for January protesters

Homayoun Shabankar's death sentence comes as Amnesty International has warned that at least 20 protesters of the January uprising are at imminent risk of execution. In recent months, Revolutionary Courts in Karaj and other cities have handed down death sentences to a number of those detained in the January uprising, and several of them have been executed.

No information has been published about Homayoun Shabankar's access to a lawyer of his choosing, the course of the trial, or an appeal against the verdict.

A 22-year-old whose only evidence of guilt is sending a few images of areas damaged in the war now faces a death sentence.