Saeed Mortazavi

Saeed Mortazavi (born 1967) is a controversial Iranian jurist, official and former prosecutor of the Islamic Revolutionary Court, and Prosecutor General of Tehran, a position he held from 2003 to 2009. He has been called as "butcher of the press" and "torturer of Tehran" by some observers. Mortazavi has been accused of the torture and death in custody of Iranian-Canadian photographer Zahra Kazemi by the Canadian government and was named by 2010 Iranian parliamentary report as the man responsible for abuse of dozens and death of three political prisoners at Kahrizak detention center in 2009. He was put on trial in February 2013 after a parliamentary committee blamed him for the torture and deaths of at least three detainees who participated in the protests against President Mahmud Ahmadinejad's reelection. On 15 November 2014, he was banned from all political and legal positions for life.

Career and actions

Before his prosecutorial appointment, Mortazavi was a judge.

On 18 May 2003 he became prosecutor general of Tehran, a position he held until 29 August 2009. The post had been unfilled for the previous eight years, since Iran abolished prosecutors in 1995. In the intervening years judges performed the prosecutor's role.