News agencies are claiming that Elaheh Hosseinnejad — a 24-year-old woman who went missing last month after using a taxi service — was raped before her murder. They are basing their claims on forensic medical reports of sexual assault, according to Rudaw, a broadcaster in Iraqi Kurdistan.
Hosseinnejad went missing after getting into a Snapp! car (a taxi service which is Iran’s equivalent of Uber) on May 25 to make her way home from her job at a beauty salon in Tehran. Elaheh’s body was found by police almost two weeks later, on June 5, in a remote desert area on the outskirts of Tehran, after the filing of a missing person report. A statement by the police said Elaheh died of stab wounds. A report by IRNA, the official news agency of the Islamic Republic of Iran, said the suspect subsequently disposed of the body at night in a section of desert near the airport.
The Iranian authorities denied the allegations of sexual assault.
“The statement by this organization that the deceased was raped is untrue,” the forensic medical department said in a report by Mizan, the Iranian judiciary’s media outlet.
The Snapp! car driver who picked up Elaheh before she went missing was arrested on June 5 and placed in custody.
Tehran intelligence police chief Ali Valipour confirmed that Elaheh had been murdered and that an investigation had been ordered into her death. Iranian officials said the driver operated an unlicensed taxi and had a criminal record. Mizan reported that the suspect had a history of family-related offenses, but no prior criminal records for theft, assault, or sexual violence.
Several possible motives for the murder have been suggested by news agencies in recent days, including the attempted theft of Elaheh’s phones, and a desire to punish Elaheh for not wearing the hijab, which is compulsory for women in the Islamic Republic.
“The suspect’s Instagram page shows repeated expressions of support for the concept of Velayat-e Faqih (Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist) and for individuals connected to the ruling system in Iran,” said Tannaz Kolahchian, a human rights lawyer based outside Iran, in an interview with Kayhan Life. “This could be a contributing factor with regards to motivation. The victim was unveiled while in his car, and it is possible that a dispute over the hijab occurred.”
“The core issue is a systematic attempt to enforce a law that is fundamentally rooted in coercion. The regime is doing everything it can to prove how ‘beneficial’ hijab is for women—yet this supposed benefit is being promoted through violence, murder, and the silencing of women,” Kolahchian said.
“The implicit message is: if you don’t wear the hijab, there are people out there who will attack you, threaten your safety, and even kill your daughters—leading to fear, inaction, and suppression in society,” she noted. “This is being used as justification to accelerate the enforcement of the hijab law and to force women into compliance, reflecting the Islamic Republic’s ideological commitment to compulsory hijab.”
The Islamic Republic has been repeatedly accused by human rights bodies of enabling and committing acts of violence against women in the country, after the government introduced draconian laws to punish women and girls who failed to wear the hijab in public spaces.
The regime faced a global backlash following the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, who was detained for allegedly flouting hijab laws and who died while in police custody. The mysterious deaths of several other unveiled young women in Iran since 2022 have added to the international outcry.
The government’s ‘Hijab and Chastity Law’ – a proposed legislative bill which imposes even harsher penalties, prison terms, floggings and fines for failing to adhere to the strict dress code — was blocked by Iran’s own National Security Council in December, following a letter from the council to Iran’s parliament requesting a stay to amend the bill. The bill and its 74 articles were termed a form of “gender-based persecution” by United Nations experts in a December statement published by the UN Human Rights Council.
Under the proposed bill, women can be charged with prostitution or the promotion of prostitution if they refuse to wear the veil, or promote a woman’s right to dress in ways which are not compatible with the law. This offense carries a minimum one-year prison sentence, and a maximum sentence of 10 years in jail. Several hijab-related offenses contained in the bill carry the death penalty.
Kolahchian said she believed the government is raising the profile of Elaheh’s murder to advocate for the death penalty in Iran, which has been criticized by human rights activists and lawyers in the country as well as human rights watchdogs in recent years. Iran is currently the most prolific executioner of children, women and men globally.
“Right now, there is a growing movement in Iran against the death penalty. In Iranian prisons and across civil society, people are raising their voices in protest, shouting ‘No to execution.’ Activists—both inside Iran and abroad—are united in this campaign. And yet the regime is trying to exploit this situation to undermine that very movement,” Kolahchian said.
“They are orchestrating a scenario in which someone commits a deliberate act of murder that legally carries the death penalty. Then, the regime turns to society and says: ‘Look, you’re all saying no to execution—but now the suspect in Elaheh Hosseinnejad’s murder has been arrested. If he is found guilty, should the government execute him, or should your anti-death-penalty campaign stop this execution?”
“This is clearly a systematic and coordinated effort to undermine human rights activism in Iran—whether it is the campaign against compulsory hijab or the widespread, unified movement against the death penalty,” Kolahchian added.
