Report
Maysoon Majidi is not a smuggler: Iranian activist acquitted
The indictment tried to substantiate Maysoon's supposed complicity with the crime syndicate that organized the crossing from Turkey. However, the evidence in support of this claim is weak, specious and vague.
At 5:02 p.m. Feb. 5, the nightmare Maysoon Majidi had been trapped in, the Kurdish-Iranian activist and filmmaker indicted in Crotone on charges of aiding and abetting illegal immigration, finally came to an end. A Kafkaesque trial, a grotesque affair and an almost 400-day ordeal ended with the curt formula: “Acquitted for not having committed the act.”
Maysoon was not a human trafficker, “a stewardess on board” as prosecutor Rossella Multari outrageously called her in her 95-minute indictment speech. Maysoon Majidi is in fact “a victim of political persecution, not an economic migrant, who fled Iran to escape persecution from the regime. Thirty-seven organizations have confirmed that I have been working with them during these years,” as Maysoon introduced herself during a brief voluntary address at the start of the hearing.
For the first time during this trial, she arrived in Crotone as a free woman after her release from prison on October 2. She appeared in courtroom 3 for criminal hearings at the Court in Viale Mazzini at 11 a.m. She wore a keffiyeh with the colors of the Kurdistan flag around her neck, and in her backpack she also had the front page of our newspaper that featured her case. She seemed calm, but only on the surface. In reality, she was clearly feeling the pressure. The warm support of the Free Maysoon network managed to put her a little more at ease. The courtroom was packed to capacity. The only politician present was regional councilor Ferdinando Laghi, along with Francesco Saccomanno of the Communist Refoundation party.
ARCI was present in the person of provincial president Filippo Sestito, together with delegations from Catanzaro, Reggio, Cosenza and Vibo Valentia. Activists came in from as far as Brindisi for a case that has had a significant impact among the public. The defense followed its carefully planned trial strategy and waived its right to the examination of the defendant, giving the floor to the prosecution. In the indictment, the prosecutor attacked the press and media from the start “for having set up a media trial, while the prosecution avoided going on TV shows.”
The indictment tried to substantiate Maysoon's supposed complicity with the crime syndicate that organized the crossing from Turkey. However, the evidence in support of this claim is weak, specious and vague. Defense attorney Gianfranco Liberati had a field day dismantling the prosecution’s theory in his own address: “The receipts of payment for the trip confirm that Maysoon was simply a passenger who, like all migrants, had her cell phone confiscated, which was indeed turned off from December 26 to December 30.”
As for why she left the boat after being stranded at Gabella on a dinghy with five other shipwrecked migrants, including the captain and his brother Rezhan, this was solely due to her fear of being deported to Iran. While the prosecutor requested a sentence of 2 years and 4 months together with an enormous fine of 1 million euros, the defense reiterated its request for a full acquittal.
After the judges briefly withdrew to their chambers, President Edoardo D'Ambrosio read out the sentence as the public broke out in celebration. “Woman, life and freedom,” chanted the 50 activists present. Maysoon's defense counsel was happy with the acquittal: “My client was a victim twice over, of traffickers and of an investigation that almost destroyed her, bodily and mentally. It is never easy to predict a sentence, but there were all the conditions for a full acquittal, and so it was. The prosecutor pleaded her case for over an hour. She also submitted a large brief to argue something that, in my view, was untenable.”
He went on: “In my defense argument, I pointed out all the inconsistencies in the indictment, which had already emerged at the examination of witnesses on Maysoon's behalf on October 22, the date of her release. Together with her steadfastness and determination to put an end to this very ugly chapter of her life.” The fear was over, and Maysoon’s supporters got together to celebrate at an ARCI club.
Originally published at https://ilmanifesto.it/non-e-una-scafista-maysoon-majidi-assolta on 2025-02-06