From Conviction to a Life Behind Bars
In 2022, Bahram Razvani, a 33-year-old Iranian asylum seeker, was sentenced to 12 years in Wakefield’s maximum security prison after admitting to raping an intoxicated woman as she slept in Leicester. Police called him “predatory,” and his arrival in prison brought tensions from the start. Over the following two years, Razvani developed a record of violence against fellow inmates, and his existence behind the walls was marked by hostility, danger, and deep isolation.
A Brutal Attack and Lingering Shadows
June 2024 became a turning point. Inside a cell, Razvani suffered a vicious assault, leaving him with multiple facial fractures and a torn artery in his neck. Authorities believed he might have been drugged beforehand, a chilling possibility that made the attack easier to carry out. Following emergency treatment, he was placed in the prison’s healthcare unit before eventually being moved to B Wing. On the surface, life appeared to resume — but unseen wounds, both physical and emotional, lingered in the shadows of his confinement.
The Final Act and an Unlikely Tribute
On 31 July 2025, the silence of the prison was broken by grim news: Razvani had been found hanged in his cell. An inquest confirmed his death was suicide, though the Ombudsman’s investigation revealed no clear signs he had been at imminent risk in the days before. Initially, staff struggled to find his next of kin. But when they learned his faith required specific burial customs, they took care to honor them. A funeral director in Bradford was contacted, and the prison covered the extra costs to ensure the rites were respected. The Ombudsman praised the staff’s “sensitivity and attention to detail”, calling it a rare moment of dignity in an otherwise tragic story.
His death, occurring just over two years into his sentence, leaves behind questions about life inside the prison system — and a somber reminder that even those who have inflicted deep harm on others may still leave this world under the weight of their own broken humanity.
