Story
Fatemeh Samsarpour, a 49-year-old resident of Tehran originally from Babol, was fatally shot on June 20, 2009, during the widespread protests following Iran’s disputed tenth presidential election. She lived with her husband, Hassan, and their two sons, Kaveh and Koosha, in an alley just off Azadi Street. Their home was located directly behind a judicial complex and near a police building that was reportedly being used that day as a command center and staging area for Basij snipers.
Around 6:45 PM, hearing an explosion outside, Samsarpour and her eldest son, Kaveh, went down to the alley to investigate, while Koosha watched from a window. As armed military personnel pursued protesters into the alley, a neighboring building manager raised his hands and warned them not to fire due to a nearby gas pipe. The personnel responded by shooting the manager in the leg before opening fire on Samsarpour and Kaveh, striking her in the heart and her son in the stomach.
Bystanders rushed the injured mother and son to Behgar Clinic and then to Shahriar Hospital. Hassan, who endured baton blows from security forces while racing to find his family, arrived to discover that his wife had passed away due to a lack of timely medical attention. Kaveh survived the night only because a volunteer physician, Dr. Dehkhoda, arrived late to perform emergency surgery; the injury ultimately required a second operation and the removal of 25 centimeters of Kaveh's intestine.
In the aftermath, authorities refused to release Samsarpour’s body until Hassan gathered local testimonies stating she had not been part of the demonstrations, and signed a pledge promising not to file a complaint or hold a memorial service. Her body was washed at Behesht-e Zahra cemetery and secretly buried at night in Babol. The trauma of witnessing the event left Koosha severely emotionally disturbed and under psychiatric care, while Hassan was initially forced into silence to protect his surviving sons.
Hassan eventually rejected the mandated silence and filed a formal complaint with the Military Prosecutor’s Office. The judiciary closed the matter by stating that since the specific military assailant was unidentified, the family could only claim blood money from the public treasury. Rejecting the financial settlement, the family continued to protest the decision, seeking criminal accountability for the shooting, though the legal system provided no further resolution.