Toronto District School Board Candidates Richard Klagsbrun (TDSB Ward 10/Trinity-Spadina) and Jerako Biaje (TDSB Ward 5/York Centre) unveil Curriculum Pledge

Toronto District School Board Candidates Richard Klagsbrun (TDSB Ward 10/Trinity-Spadina) and Jerako Biaje (TDSB Ward 5/York Centre) have crafted a Curriculum Pledge for Trustee candidates in the upcoming municipal election on October 27 to address what they see as major problems with the school curriculum. They believe the current approach inhibits the ability of the Board's students to get the type of education they will require in an increasingly technologically-based, competitive, global environment.  There are serious issues involving the way that the curriculum is delivered in Toronto's Public Schools, including a math curriculum which increasingly emphasises word-based problems which are designed to instil politicized attitudes. Though the Province is responsible for shaping the curriculum, the TDSB has a great deal of latitude in establishing how that curriculum is delivered to its students. As emphasis at the Toronto District School Board has shifted away from providing students with core math and language skills, and increasing numbers of university professors are concerned about post-secondary students graduating high school without requisite skills, Klagsbrun and Biaje feel that a focus on the core subjects of English/Reading, Math and Sciences needs to be restored in the TDSB. Accordingly, they have written the following Curriculum Pledge, which they invite all TDSB candidates to sign:

"We pledge as Trustees to work towards restoring the focus of the public school curriculum on core subjects - Math, Reading/English, and Science. We pledge to do all we can to restore an evidence and fact-based approach to education, in which learning is predicated on using objective facts rather than unsubstantiated opinion and trendy theories. We also pledge to work towards removing the politicized aspects of the curriculum and work towards providing an education which gives students the tools to employ logic, verifiable truth, and reason. Along with students, parents, and teachers, we pledge to do everything we can to enable our students to become successful, engaged citizens."

Richard Klagsbrun,  TDSB Candidate - Ward 10 (Trinity-Spadina) www.klagsbrun.ca

Jerako Biaje, TDSB Candidate - Ward 5 (York Centre) https://www.facebook.com/JerakoBiaje

Richard Klagsbrun is the former Creative and Strategic Planning Executive at Participant Media who was instrumental in conceiving the phenomenally successful marketing model used to make that organization's films, such as the Academy-Award winning An Inconvenient Truth. He is a writer and commentator on education issues in national publications and television, and has worked in both the private and public sector, including having organized the symposium which established, and being one of the first two staff members of, the Centre for Addiction And Mental Heath's Shared Care Clinical Outreach Program, which provides medical and psychiatric care to homeless people in Toronto residing in shelters. Richard has also been a social media entrepreneur, being the co-founder and Senior Vice President of View2gether, which pioneered online social viewing. Richard is deeply engaged with the community in Trinity-Spadina, and that engagement includes having been a co-Chair of the Parents' Council at Central Technical School. His current candidacy for TDSB Trustee in Trinity-Spadina is his first time seeking public office, and he has assembled an unparalleled group of endorsers for his TDSB Trustee campaign effort.

Jerako Biaje is  the TDSB School Trustee Candidate for WARD 5, Advocate, Mediator, Wife, Mother, and a Former Co-Chair of the TDSB's Parent Involvement Advisory Committee

For more information contact Campaign for Richard Klagsbrun:  VoteRichard@Outlook.com

Toronto District School Board Candidates Richard Klagsbrun (TDSB Ward 10/Trinity-Spadina) and Jerako Biaje (TDSB Ward 5/York Centre) unveil Curriculum Pledge

Toronto District School Board Candidates Richard Klagsbrun (TDSB Ward 10/Trinity-Spadina) and Jerako Biaje (TDSB Ward 5/York Centre) have crafted a Curriculum Pledge for Trustee candidates in the upcoming municipal election on October 27 to address what they see as major problems with the school curriculum. They believe the current approach inhibits the ability of the Board's students to get the type of education they will require in an increasingly technologically-based, competitive, global environment.  There are serious issues involving the way that the curriculum is delivered in Toronto's Public Schools, including a math curriculum which increasingly emphasises word-based problems which are designed to instil politicized attitudes. Though the Province is responsible for shaping the curriculum, the TDSB has a great deal of latitude in establishing how that curriculum is delivered to its students. As emphasis at the Toronto District School Board has shifted away from providing students with core math and language skills, and increasing numbers of university professors are concerned about post-secondary students graduating high school without requisite skills, Klagsbrun and Biaje feel that a focus on the core subjects of English/Reading, Math and Sciences needs to be restored in the TDSB. Accordingly, they have written the following Curriculum Pledge, which they invite all TDSB candidates to sign:

"We pledge as Trustees to work towards restoring the focus of the public school curriculum on core subjects - Math, Reading/English, and Science. We pledge to do all we can to restore an evidence and fact-based approach to education, in which learning is predicated on using objective facts rather than unsubstantiated opinion and trendy theories. We also pledge to work towards removing the politicized aspects of the curriculum and work towards providing an education which gives students the tools to employ logic, verifiable truth, and reason. Along with students, parents, and teachers, we pledge to do everything we can to enable our students to become successful, engaged citizens."

Richard Klagsbrun,  TDSB Candidate - Ward 10 (Trinity-Spadina) www.klagsbrun.ca

Jerako Biaje, TDSB Candidate - Ward 5 (York Centre) https://www.facebook.com/JerakoBiaje

Richard Klagsbrun is the former Creative and Strategic Planning Executive at Participant Media who was instrumental in conceiving the phenomenally successful marketing model used to make that organization's films, such as the Academy-Award winning An Inconvenient Truth. He is a writer and commentator on education issues in national publications and television, and has worked in both the private and public sector, including having organized the symposium which established, and being one of the first two staff members of, the Centre for Addiction And Mental Heath's Shared Care Clinical Outreach Program, which provides medical and psychiatric care to homeless people in Toronto residing in shelters. Richard has also been a social media entrepreneur, being the co-founder and Senior Vice President of View2gether, which pioneered online social viewing. Richard is deeply engaged with the community in Trinity-Spadina, and that engagement includes having been a co-Chair of the Parents' Council at Central Technical School. His current candidacy for TDSB Trustee in Trinity-Spadina is his first time seeking public office, and he has assembled an unparalleled group of endorsers for his TDSB Trustee campaign effort.

Jerako Biaje is  the TDSB School Trustee Candidate for WARD 5, Advocate, Mediator, Wife, Mother, and a Former Co-Chair of the TDSB's Parent Involvement Advisory Committee

For more information contact Campaign for Richard Klagsbrun:  VoteRichard@Outlook.com

Trustee Tampering Demonstrates Need For Coalition’s Accountability Pledge

A day after fourteen trustee candidates signed a pledge of accountability, a report from The Star shows freedom of information officer Maria Mavroyannis has accused TDSB trustees of tampering with the freedom of information (FOI) process.

According to the report, Mavroyannis expressed concern “given evident trustee tampering” that the credibility of the FOI process may have been compromised by attempts to alter files, obfuscate, and otherwise interfere with the FOI process.

Toronto Taxpayers Coalition argues this information demonstrates the importance of their accountability pledge...

Slowdown in blogging - and notes from the campaign trail

Well, I did warn you that being a Toronto District School Board Trustee candidate would result in a slowdown in blogging and with the campaign in its last ten days, that's really taking effect.

The campaign in Trinity-Spadina continues to be fun and interesting. Today, on just a short stretch of a single street near the Annex, I was told, unprompted, by people in four separate households, that they had called NDP City Council candidate Joe Cressy's office to have him remove his sign from their lawns once they learned the facts about my opponent,  his Trustee running-mate Ausma Malik. It turns out that even in what used to be an NDP stronghold, even among people who are traditionally NDP-supporters, people aren't particularly impressed with a Trustee candidate who was a featured speaker at a pro-Hezbollah rally. Nor with Council candidates who would endorse such a person. And the fact that there are at least three articles in the University of Toronto's newspaper, The Varsity, which discusses her involvement in election-rigging while she was a union official isn't helping the NDP in Trinity-Spadina much either.

Whether the NDP was stupid or sleazy in thinking they could get away with such behavior is one of the questions I get on a regular basis. 

But my campaign is going quite well. So well, in fact, that I have heard about an NDP push-poll in the riding, where they are calling people, with the pretense of polling, but actually for the purpose of promoting their candidate.That means they're running scared.

Onward to election day on October 27!

Toronto region will need to fill 500,000 jobs in next five years

The Toronto region is expected to create more than half a million jobs in the next five years, but some will be low-paying, temporary or contract jobs without benefits, warns a new report from the Toronto Region Board of Trade and United Way Toronto.

“There are downward pressures on the labour market, which are effectively displacing youth and newcomers from those positions, which they have traditionally held,” according to Closing the Prosperity Gap for a Liveable City Region, to be released on Wednesday.

“The large number of applicants for low-paying and entry-level positions is remarkable,” said the report, the final installment of the board’s Think Twice, Vote Once series tied to this year’s elections.

“As the number of middle income jobs has continued to decline, a bifurcated labour market of high-income jobs and low-income service jobs is becoming the norm.”...

NDP's Mulcair to announce child-care policy

In a bid to attract attention and get Canadians looking at policy more than a year before the next election, the Official Opposition will put forward its child-care plan at a non-profit daycare in Ottawa...

...Unveiling a key plank of his election platform will undoubtedly open Mulcair to criticism from his opponents, particularly because the cost of the overall program is expected to be high.

Part of that will likely be defended by Pierre Fortin, an economics professor at the University of Quebec in Montreal, who will be on hand to answer questions. Fortin has done extensive research on how Quebec's child-care program affects the work force.

In a study from 2012, Fortin and his colleagues concluded that after the low-cost daycare program was launched in 1997, originally at $5 a day, the rates of children in daycare exploded.

Between 1998 and 2008 the percentage of children in child care grew to 43 per cent from 16 per cent. There was an equally large increase in the number of Quebec women who entered the work force. Fortin suggests that increase in turn had a direct impact on gross domestic product, meaning the cost of the program can be offset by more money in government coffers through increased income taxes.

But for all the uptake in the Quebec program there are questions about sustainability. In fact, the Quebec Liberal government recently increased the daily rate slightly and hinted the province may move to a sliding scale.

A Liberal plan under then prime minister Paul Martin for a national child-care program was set to cost $5 billion over five years in 2006.

Ironically it was the NDP who helped bring down that Liberal government, leading Conservatives to power. The Conservatives scrapped the plan and chose to offer parents a universal child-care benefit of $100 a month instead.

Happy Thanksgiving Weekend!

And here's a musical version of a Thanksgiving recipe idea from that great Canadian (and interstellar) icon, Bill Shatner:

The difference between liberalism and infantilism

Union boss Sid Ryan accused of threatening and intimidating employees

The conduct of a top trade union boss is being called into question by an Ontario union, citing allegations of threats, intimidation and reprisal against employees.

Sid Ryan, President of the Ontario Federation of Labour (OFL) which represents 54 unions and one million workers in the province, is being accused of violating the Ontario Labour Relations Act by the Canadian Office and Professional Employees Local 343 (COPE).

The labour practice complaint was filed with the Ontario Labour Relations Board this week.

The unfair labour practice documentation, obtained by Sun News Network, alleges Ryan violated the Labour Relations Act by "threatening and intimidating employees".

It calls on Ryan to "rescind all discipline administered to employees", "refrain from interfering with and undermining the operation of the trade union" and "insure all the dues, etc deducted from employees be remitted to the union as required."

Ryan did not respond to a request for comment on the allegations, which have yet to be tested before the Labour Board.

Canadian news broadcasters' politically motivated restriction of the use of news footage in political ads

Pot should be legalized, regulated and sold like alcohol says Centre for Addiction and Mental Health statement

Canada’s largest mental health and addiction treatment and research centre is calling for the legalization of marijuana, with strict controls that would govern who could buy weed, from where, and in what quantity.

In a policy statement released Thursday, the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto said cannabis should be sold through a government-controlled monopoly and with limited availability and an age limit, possibly through outlets similar to provincially operated liquor stores.

“Legalization means that we remove all penalties for cannabis possession and use by adults,” said Jurgen Rehm, director of social and epidemiological research at CAMH...

Lack of focus on trustee elections is concerning

TORONTO - Trinity-Spadina public school trustee candidate Richard Klagsbrun was barely one minute into his opening statement at Monday night's debate when moderator and interim trustee Briony Glassco interrupted and warned him to just say "nice things about people."

What ruffled the feathers of the fill-in school trustee-- appointed four months ago after board chair Chris Bolton resigned over a myriad of school board scandals, including one related to his own charity--was that Klagsbrun dared raise the somewhat questionable past of his opponent...

Michael Coren with Toronto Trinity-Spadina Trustee candidate Richard Klagsbrun

Background HERE

NYC, 1985

 Rick McGinnis writes at Some Old Pictures I Took: 

WHAT HAPPENED WAS THERE WAS A GIRL. That's probably the only thing that could have made me get on a plane for the first time and fly across a border to a strange city at 21, so excited and afraid that I thought I'd be sick. As the jet banked long and low over Manhattan - it used to do that in those days - I'm sure I was shivering; I was having an adventure.

We had met the previous Christmas, working together at Simpsons Toytown; there was a thrilling date just before she went home for the holidays and a promise to see each other again when she got back. Months passed, then one day my boss at Toytown remembered a letter in her desk, sent to me care of the store: There had been a family tragedy and the girl had to stay in Fredericton but she was moving to New York to take acting classes. There was an address and a phone number.

More HERE

"Olivia Chow" becomes national shorthand for political failure

I wish I could take credit for the headline above, but I stole it from my friend, war-room director, and drinking buddy Skippy Stalin.

From National Post:

Robyn Urback: Could the ‘Olivia Chow effect’ trip up Justin Trudeau?

...In a column last month, my colleague Matt Gurney offered an excellent explanation as to the phenomenal letdown that has been the Olivia Chow mayoral campaign. Gurney noted that Chow had launched her bid to become mayor on the heels of the release of her memoir, My Journey, and after a high-profile eight-year stint as a federal MP. Gurney also noted, correctly, that she had inherited much of the goodwill felt toward her late husband, Jack Layton, who passed away at the height of his political career. More than just a successful politician, Layton was a charismatic Canadian with an impeccable ability to captivate a room, and some of that allure, naturally, was transposed onto Chow.

And then she ran for mayor...

A Toronto Public School Board Election Debate Where The Candidates Were Only Allowed To Say Nice Things

On Monday evening, in the auditorium of Central Commerce Collegiate, I was part of an all-candidates meeting among candidates for Trustee for the Toronto District School Board in the Trinity-Spadina ward.

Due to controversy surrounding one Trustee candidate's alleged support for terrorism, the local downtown NDP establishment, which is fully behind that candidate, Ausma Malik, stacked the meeting as best it could with its supporters.

School Trustee debates are never big attention-getters anyway, and the sparse attendance at the meeting, which attracted no more than 35 people, is an indication of the extent of the downtown collapse of the NDP.  Trinity-Spadina is the same area that was held by Olivia Chow as a federal MP before she resigned to attempt to capture Toronto's mayoralty. Chow's disastrous performance in the mayoral race, in which even in her old ward she is only polling at about 25% (compared with 20% city-wide), has dragged her whole party down with her.

So the NDP is in panic mode and Malik's connection to Chow, along with her connections to high-profile local Council candidates Mike Layton and Joe Cressy, all of whom publicly endorsed each other and are running as a ticket, is something they feel the fierce need to defend.

One would normally expect an all-candidates meeting to be an opportunity for candidates to outline their positions, but also differentiate themselves from their opponents and if need be, discuss facts and matters of public interest about why their opponents might not be best suited for a position of authority.

In the case of Ms. Malik, those reasons are plentiful. Aside from delivering a vicious anti-Israel speech at a pro-Hezbollah rally, and aside from having been an organizer for a fundraiser for the families of the Toronto 18 terrorists, there are other compelling reasons to question her suitability for public office.

But when I tried to outline some very pertinent facts to the assembled audience, I was interrupted and prevented from doing so by the meeting's moderator, the ward's interim Trustee Briony Glassco.

Briony is a lovely person, but she bizarrely decided to enforce a rule I've never seen in any other election debate, explaining 'we're only having people say nice things about each other.'  One can only speculate at her reasoning, but clearly she and I have different views regarding the public's right to make an informed decision about choosing their elected representatives.

If a candidate for public office who makes ostentatious pronouncements about honoring "transparency and accountability" was implicated as a major player in a case of crooked election-rigging, I think the public should know about that. Evidently, Ms. Galssco disagrees.

Toronto's Public School Board has been plagued by scandals, mismanagement, waste, and worse, and enforcing silence about matters of major public interest only enables the perpetuation of serious problems of which the TDSB has seen far too many.

In the case of Ausma Malik, The University of Toronto's newspaper, The Varsity, published reports of how, when she was a union official there and was in charge of investigating a crooked student union election, Malik had colluded with the people she was investigating to produce a result they wanted.

The breach of trust was so blatant that the University's Provost stepped in and withheld funds to that student union.

You might think that a candidate for public office, who has repeatedly called for more transparency and accountability, would want to explain something like that. But Ms Malik has only characterized drawing attention to that as "mean-spirited attacks" designed to keep people (i.e. her) from public service.

Well, I guess I'm just a big meanie if I think the public deserves to know that someone implicated in election-rigging, to say nothing of her other deplorable activities, might not be the best person to have a say over an annual $3 Billion taxpayer budget and have a major influence over how education is delivered in Toronto's public schools.

Fortunately, Sue-Ann Levy of The Toronto Sun was at the meeting and the facts will get out in the media through her. Jonathan Goldsbie of the NDP-supporting NOW Magazine was there too and I'm expecting to be portrayed as an ogre by him in his report. But I'd be very surprised if he goes into much, if any honest detail about Ms Malik's controversies.

But what remains of all this, and what I reiterated to the audience at the end, is that there is a need to scrutinize the candidates, and to find out what they really stand for. The voters may disagree with me, they may not vote for me, but at least I'm upfront about who I am and where I stand, including detailed policy proposals, so voters have an opportunity to make their assessment of me based on fact. It's when candidates obfuscate and mislead about what they stand for that harms democracy, and when that happens, it only helps make the system more corrupt.

One thing that certainly did emerge at that meeting is that I am the only candidate in the Trinity-Spadina TDSB Trustee contest for whom the term  "transparency and accountability" is more than a meaningless platitude.

As an addendum, despite the stacked crowd's opposition to me, on my way out to have a beer with one of my opponents in the race, one woman, who I'd never seen before, called to me to let me know my message had got out. She told me she supports Mike Layton, but no longer wants his sign on her yard, since Ausma Malik's name is also plastered on Layton's signage.

That was encouraging, but considering much of the media is focusing on other aspects of the municipal election, it's uncertain whether Trinity-Spadina's public school trustee race will get the attention it needs to serve the public interest.

Rumors that Has Kim Jong-Un has lost control of North Korea

A former North Korean counter-intelligence officer has claimed that Kim Jong-Un is no longer in control of the nation and is now just a 'puppet leader'.

Jang Jin-sung, who used to be an influential officer in Kim Jong-il's propaganda division, made the sensational assertion at a September conference in Holland attended by several elite exiles, it's been reported.

The capital, Pyongyang, meanwhile, has been placed into lockdown with even the elite banned from entering or leaving, according to a respected news site. This adds weight to Jin-sung's claim, as a North Korean expert said that this kind of measure is only put in place when a coup has taken place - or is suspected...

U.S. widow takes first step in what could be $134M judgement against Omar Khadr

TORONTO — A default certificate has been entered in a civil suit filed in Utah against Canada’s Omar Khadr by the widow of a U.S. special forces soldier and another soldier partially blinded by a grenade.

The court entry is a first step in obtaining a final judgment that could be worth as much as US$134-million.

“We’ve got the entry of default, that’s pretty awesome,” Laura Tanner, one of the plaintiffs’ U.S. lawyers, said from Salt Lake City Friday.

The registration comes after Khadr, who was served with the lawsuit in prison in Alberta in June, failed to respond even though lawyers considering acting for him had twice requested time extensions to do so, court documents show.

“We haven’t seen anything, no appearance of anybody, which is actually pretty strange,” Ms. Tanner said.

Khadr’s Canadian lawyers have said they were unable to find a U.S. lawyer to represent him at no charge...

Trinity-Spadina Public School Board Debate Tomorrow Evening

Tomorrow, at 7 PM sharp, there will be an all candidates meeting for Public School Trustee candidates running in Toronto's Trinity-Spadina ward.

I'm running in this race, which has heated up a lot since it became public knowledge that one of my opponents, whom mayoral candidate Olivia Chow endorsed, was a featured speaker at a rally supporting the Islamist terror group Hezbollah.

If you can make it, the details are here:

Date: Monday, October 6, 2014

Time: 7:00pm - 8:30pm (Please arrive at least 15 minutes early as we will start promptly at 7:00 pm)

Location: Central Commerce Collegiate (Central Toronto Academy) Auditorium , 

570 Shaw St, Toronto, ON, M6G 3L6

Woman sues employer after being refused paid maternity leave for adopting a puppy

Well, it's definitely cuter than your average human baby, but 40 weeks to toilet train a puppy seems a bit excessive to me... UPDATE: And as it turns out, the article is a joke (not that you haven't heard equally outrageous stupidity from "Human Rights Commissions."  We live in trolling times, where the truth is so absurd, it's hard to tell what's satire. )

Photo: (Frank Kovalchek/FLICKR)

Statistics show that 80% of Canadian mothers take paid maternity leave after giving birth. Well, recently a case has surfaced in Ontario which will likely forever change the way Canadians perceive the concept of maternity leave. 31 year-old, Barrie, Ontario resident Trish Lemierre is suing her employer after they refused to give her paid maternity leave after she adopted a six week old Bichon Frise puppy. 

"I want my 40 weeks just like any other mother."

Trish Lamierre, puppy owner

more HERE

York University ISIS recruit reportedly killed in Syria

A former biology student at York was allegedly killed as an ISIS fighter in Syria.

Mohamud Mohamed Mohamud, 20 and from Hamilton, is thought to have left for Syria this summer after family and friends noticed changes in his demeanor.

 More HERE

Toronto District School Board loses Superior Court appeal on Central Tech field

As those following my TDSB Trustee campaign know, I am opposed to the commercial development of the Central Tech field and the manner in which the Toronto District School Board obfuscated about and then tried to ram through the process. So this court decision comes as good news:   

The fate of a recreational facility at a Toronto high school is in jeopardy after the school board lost its court appeal against the city.

The Toronto District School Board was looking to overturn a decision by Superior Court Justice David Corbett, who ruled in June that the board’s plan to enter into a private partnership and build an artificial turf field and seasonal dome at Central Technical School was not exempt from the city’s zoning regulations.

The divisional court ruled on Tuesday that the city’s move was reasonable and that the $6-million sports facility, operated by Razor Management Inc. (RMI), would not qualify for the “teaching or instructional purposes” bylaw exemption.

“The [chief building official’s] finding that the bulk of the RMI use would not include an instructional component was a reasonable finding of fact, based on the information provided to the City,” wrote the panel of Ontario Divisional Court judges.

The TDSB said in a statement Tuesday that it was disappointed with the decision and will be moving forward with an Ontario Municipal Board appeal. A hearing has not been scheduled.

The Toronto Taxpayers Coalition's election guide is out!

I'm running for Public School trustee in Toronto's Trinity-Spadina ward.

"Richard Klagsbrun’s answers were very specific and addressed all issues, and he proposed unique and detailed solutions such as analyzing the value of TDSB conferences and alternative schools, forensic audits of expenses, and contracting out some services while still giving careful thought to the issue of students with special needs."

You can read about some of my policy proposals HERE

Awwwwww.....!! (A cute cat upstaging a lovely song)

Trust Iran? It Just Hanged a Man For Doubting ‘Jonah and the Whale’

...in Iran, Mohsen Amir Aslani, a prisoner of conscience, was executed in the last act of a truly Kafkaesque legal process. Aslani, 37, was hanged in Rajaei Shahr Prison in Karaj at dawn on Wednesday September 24 for committing heresy and allegedly insulting the Prophet Jonah (Yunus in the Qur’an)—the one swallowed by a “big fish”; the one that God used to teach the lesson of compassion.

On the previous day, a prison official contacted Aslani’s parents and asked them to come and visit their son one final time. Prior to this, no information about his arrest or trial was made public because his family was led to believe that by keeping quiet about his arrest, he would eventually be released. News broke about his fate only hours before the sentence was carried out,  when a neighbor’s relative posted the news on Facebook and then shortly afterwards the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) reported that Amir Aslani was being kept in solitary confinement and was awaiting his execution. This was almost eight years after his arrest, and yet was the first time word of his situation became public.

Before his imprisonment, Amir Aslani was a family man who worked as a psychologist but was interested in theology and gave religious classes that looked at different interpretations of the Qur’an. This was the cause for his arrest and nine months in solitary confinement in Cell Block 209 of Evin Prison in 2006. His original sentence was four years but was initially reduced to 28 months by the appeals court until Judge Abolghasem Salavati, an infamous “hanging judge,” handed down the death penalty on new, unfounded charges...