Mechanism of oxidative dearomatisation with hypervalent iodine
The conventional mechanism is as follows:



The phenol displaces one acetate group on iodine – this makes the iodine itself act as what is essentially a fancy leaving group. Nucleophilic attack at either the ortho or para position allows the loss of iodobenzene and another molecule of acetic acid. What I can't explain right now is why it chooses to go para rather than ortho; it probably depends on the exact substitution pattern as I have seen examples of both. A good reference for this is Zhdankin, Hypervalent Iodine Chemistry (2013).