Niraj Warikoo

Detroit Free Press

In a lawsuit filed this week against Iran's government, Amir Hekmati of Flint said he was brutally tortured -- whipped, given electrical shocks and forced to take addictive drugs -- while being held in a prison in Iran for four and a half years.

Hekmati, a former U.S. Marine, was imprisoned in Iran on false allegations that he was a spy, said the lawsuit. Born in Arizona to immigrants from Iran, Hekmati had been visiting Iran in 2011 to see his grandmother and relatives. He was released in January after a campaign by many to release him and arrived back in Flint, given a hero's welcome.

"Hekmati was falsely imprisoned and tortured for a period of four and a half years by Defendant The Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran, its Ministries, Agencies," reads the federal lawsuit filed Monday in Washington, D.C. "On August 29, 2011, just two days before he was scheduled to return home to Michigan, Mr. Hekmati was arrested and imprisoned by Iranian officials without warning as he was getting ready to attend a family holiday celebration."

The lawsuit said "Hekmati suffered prolonged and continuous physical abuse at the hands of the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence."

"The torture that Mr. Hekmati endured included being whipped at the bottom of his feet, struck by an electrical Taser to his kidney area, forced to stay in stress positions for hours at a time, and hit with batons. Prison guards threw water on his cell floor to prevent him from sleeping. A very bright light was kept on 24 hours a day to invoke sensory deprivation."

The torture included being forced to take addictive drugs, which then were abruptly stopped, said the lawsuit.

"Hekmati’s captors would force him to take lithium and other addictive pills and then stop giving him the pills to invoke withdrawal symptoms. He was denied proper medical care and suffered severe malnutrition. Mr. Hekmati also suffered extreme and continuous psychological torture. He had virtually no human contact for 17 months."

In 2012, "he was sentenced to death—the first American to receive a death sentence since the Islamic Revolution in 1979," said the lawsuit.

An official with the Interests Section of the Islamic Republic of Iran, part of Pakistan's Embassy in the U.S., could not be reached for comment on Wednesday. No one picked up their phone.

Amir Hekmati arrives in Flint, happy to be home

“Iran’s treatment of Amir Hekmati was utterly contemptible,” said Hekmati's attorney, Scott Gilbert in a statement. “Amir was arrested on phony charges, thrown into brutal solitary confinement in one of the world’s most inhumane prisons, and then subjected to prolonged physical and psychological abuse,including beatings, electric Taser-ing, sleep deprivation, and the forced ingestion of dangerous drugs."

"Amir can never be adequately compensated for his suffering and the lasting impact that this has had, and will have, on the rest of his life," said Gilbert, who was retained by the family of Hekmati in 2015 to help get him released. "Our intention, with the filing of this lawsuit, is to attempt to provide at least some measure of justice for Amir and his family.”

The lawsuit seeks compensation from Iran's government for Hekmati's injuries. This is the latest legal case in the U.S. involving accusations that Iran's government is tied to extremism. Last month, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that victims of the 1983 bombing of a U.S. Marine Corps barracks in Lebanon tied to Iran could get the assets of Iran's central bank in New York as compensation, the Associated Press reported.

"Hekmati served in the U.S. Marine Corps from 2001 to 2005 as an infantry rifleman and translator," said a statement on Hekmati's behalf. "He completed two lengthy tours of duty in Iraq where he served in the 2nd Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment, a unit that suffered one of the highest casualty rates in the Marines. He left the Marines a dedicated combat veteran, having received the Good Conduct Medal, Global War on Terror Service Medal, Sea Service Deployment Ribbon, GWOT Expeditionary Medal, National Defense Service Medal, and a Combat Action Ribbon."

The lawsuit that Hekmati "was permitted to leave his cell for only 20 minutes every 3 days, and even then, it was only to take a freezing cold shower. He was interrogated regularly. Intelligence officials repeatedly insulted Mr. Hekmati’s mother and family and his country. He was taunted for serving honorably as a U.S. Marine. At one point, he was told that his sister had been involved in a terrible car accident, but that he could not use the phone to call his family unless he confessed that he was a spy for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)."

Contact Niraj Warikoo: nwarikoo@freepress.com or 313-223-4792. Follow him on Twitter @nwarikoo