In May 2018, Elham Ahmadi, a Gonabadi Dervish, sent an audio file outside Qarchak prison in which she described Dervish women’s painful circumstance.*

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Many reports indicated that Dervish women were subjected to mistreatment and inhumane conditions in Qarchak prison, including physical punishment, constant verbal abuse, and denied proper medical treatment. After that, Mehdi Mohammadi, the head of Qarchak prison, filed a complaint against Ahmadi. She was sentenced to 148 lashes on charges of “disseminating lies and insulting prison guards.” She did not have an attorney at her trial. She had been arrested after the clashes in Golestan-e Haftom. She was sentenced to five years’ imprisonment. The court of appeals, however, later reduced her sentence to one year and six months’ imprisonment. Her husband, Jafar Ahmadi, was also arrested during the Golestan-e Haftom protests. He was sentenced to 5 years’ imprisonment, 74 lashes, and 2 years’ exile in Kerman Province. He is currently serving his exile sentence.

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