Irans community was in shock over the death of environmentalist Kavous Seyed Emami, one of the countrys most revered professors, who was detained only few days before authorities claimed that he had committed suicide. Judicial officials said he was involved in a spying case, while other government and parliament officials raised doubts and called on the judiciary to give out information and be transparent. An Iranian news agency quoted the judiciary as saying that an Iranian-Canadian activist had committed suicide during his detention because there were many revelations against him. Kavous Seyed-Emami’s son wrote on Twitter that his father, arrested on Jan. 24, had died in Evin prison. Environmental activist Seyed-Emami, 63, a dual national, was a sociology professor at Iran’s Imam Sadegh University. “The news of my father’s passing is impossible to fathom,” son Raam Emami wrote. “I still can’t believe this,” he added. The family has asked for an independent autopsy, he said, Reuters reported. Tehrans chief prosecutor Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi told the ILNA news agency that Emami "was one of the accused and given that he knew there were many revelations against him and that he himself had made confessions, unfortunately he committed suicide in prison." Dolatabadi had said on Saturday that several people linked to environmental causes had been arrested on espionage charges. Emamis son said on Twitter that security officials had informed his mother on Friday that his father had committed suicide in prison. The Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI), a non-profit group based in New York, said at least nine other staff members and executives of Seyed-Emami’s organization had been arrested on the same day as him, citing a relative of one of those detained.