“The whole thing was an experience like being buried alive.”

As an investigative journalist, Sharam Rafizadeh exposed illegal arrests and reported on serial murders. One of his articles, entitled “The Miracle Room,” reported on prisoners’ confessions under pressure and torture. In the article, Rafizadeh refers to the interrogation room where prisoners are tortured as “the miracle room” — a place where a person miraculously confesses to anything he has, or has not, done. When he was arrested, Rafizadeh was taken to this room.

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Shahram Rafizadeh - "Miracle Room" from Journalism is not a crime on Vimeo.

Watch more videos in this series:

Working as a Journalist in Iran: The Psychological Impacts

Siamak Ghaderi - 9 months Imprisonment

Siamak Ghaderi - Torture in Toilet

Siamak Ghaderi - Imprisonment’s Effect on Family Life

Siamak Ghaderi - Cleric Fainted When Forced to Confess on TV

Farzaneh Mirzavand: A Journalist’s Wife

Fereshteh Ghazi - Illegal Arrest

Fereshteh Ghazi - They Broke My Nose During Interrogation

Fereshteh Ghazi - Charged with Espionage

Fereshteh Ghazi - I Was Put in a Cell With Dangerous Criminals

Fereshteh Ghazi - My Interrogator Lied that My Mother had Died

Shahram Rafizadeh - Sexual Innuendo

Shahram Rafizadeh - “Miracle Room”

Naeimeh Doostdar - Detained on a Plane

Naeimeh Doostdar - Evin, The Notorious Prison

Naeimeh Doostdar - Psychological Tortures

Naeimeh Doostdar - They Ignored Our Feminine Needs