Kelly Siegler reflects on a love story which turned tragic.

Gelareh Bagherzadeh, an Iranian women’s rights activist and best friend to Nesreen Irsan was murdered. The graduate student was shot to death in her Houston, Texas driveway in 2012, according to NBC News.

The veteran prosecutor recalls when the case first began to hit news stations.  

“I remember when it happened here in Houston,” Siegler told Oxygen. “I remember thinking, ‘Oh my god, who did this?'”

Police looked into if Bagherzadeh’s political activism to see if it sparked a possible motive for her killer.

“She was an activist so that kind of complicates things from the beginning,” Siegler said about the early investigation. “It was just the kind of case, it was different enough and unusual enough and so sad that such a cool young lady gets murdered. What happened? So that got everybody’s attention.”

After Nesreen’s husband Coty Beavers was also shot and killed later that year, authorities began to piece together a different picture.

Here’s what to Siegler had to say about the Season 2 finale of Prosecuting Evil focused on the case.

The case against Ali Mahwood-Awad Irsan

Nesreen married Coty Beavers and converted from Islam to Christianity, a move her friend Bagherzadeh supported. However, her father Ali Mahwood-Awad Irsan was against the marriage and believed Nesreen was bringing “dishonor” to her family. Interviews with Nesreen and authorities featured in the Oxygen episode detail her father threatening and stalking the couple. 

Evidence recovered tied Ali to both murders. He was eventually charged with capital murder and testified at trial.

“I think this one was different because of the whole religious aspect,” Siegler said about the case. “It was definitely about religion to the degree that that’s why he thought he could control his daughter, but then the prosecutors had to walk the line in not saying anything about religion in a way that would offend anybody.”

Kelly Siegler on heated cross examination in Prosecuting Evil

Friends of Siegler’s, including Marie Primm, were appointed as special prosecutors on the case, Siegler shared with Oxygen. 

“I knew them really well and I also knew the defense lawyers really well, you know, it’s a small world and everybody was paying attention to that case,” Siegler said. “Defendants in murder cases testifying is not common so when they do you remember it.”

Ali took the stand and Primm cross-examined him. 

“It’s more rare than you think that defendants take the stand in murder cases,” Siegler said. “I’m sure she was a little excited to see how he would act on the stand. To see if she could probably make him get out of his comfort zone, which it sounds like she really did and I bet that’s going to be one of her cross-examines, and in her mind, goes down in her history book because it was so fun and different.”

To learn more about the case watch Prosecuting Evil with Kelly Siegler, only on Oxygen.