SIX AND
HALF YEARS IN
PENAL COLONY REPLACED BY SUSPENDED SENTENCE FOR PSKOV JEHOVIST
by Ivan
Zhuravkov
The
Pskov oblast
court replaced real prison time with a suspended sentence for
61-year-old
Jehovah's Witness Gennady Shpakovsky, 7x7 was told at the
court's
administration.
"I am
shocked by
this decision. It is possible that the prosecutor's office will
appeal it.
Shpakovsky will be released shortly; documents for his release
have already
been issued," Arli Chimirov, the defendant's lawyer, told 7x7.
Shpakovsky
was
previously sentenced by a Pskov city court to 6.5 years in a
penal colony on a
charge of arranging the activity of a local cell of Jehovah's
Witnesses and of
financing an extremist organization.
During
the debates of
the sides, the prosecutor asked for giving Shpakovsky 7.5 years
in a penal
colony with subsequent restriction of liberty for 1.5 years—the
longest prison
term that had been discussed in trials during the persecution of
Jehovah's
Witnesses in modern Russia.
In the
summer of
2018, a criminal case was initiated against him after a search
in the home of
Gennady Shpakovsky. A trial was held in the autumn of 2019. At
the trial it was
revealed that back before the search, personnel of the regional
F.S.B.
surveilled the believer: a camera and audio recorder were
installed in his home
and all his actions on a computer were read. In March 2020,
Shpakovsky's fellow
believers were not admitted to the trial because of the
coronavirus.
In 2017
the Russian
Supreme Court banned and liquidated the Administrative Center of
Jehovah's
Witnesses in Russia as an extremist organization. After that,
representatives
of the confession began complaining that Russian security agents
have viewed
their religious confession as membership in a forbidden
organization. (tr. by
PDS, posted 3 August 2020)
COURT
REPLACES REAL
IMPRISONMENT FOR PSKOV JEHOVAH'S WITNESS WITH SUSPENDED
SENTENCE
A
court replaced real-time
imprisonment for Pskov Jehovah's Witness Gennady Shpakovsky,
who was sentenced
to 6.5 years in a penal colony, with a suspended sentence,
Severo-Zapad MBKh
Media writes.
The
decision for
real-time imprisonment for 6.5 years was made earlier by a
Pskov city court. In
the context of an appeal of the case, on 3 August the Pskov
oblast court
changed the punishment to a suspended sentence.
An
appeal of the
sentence was filed not only by the lawyer but also by Gennady
Shpakovsky
himself. In it he wrote that he had been convicted for actions
that are not a
crime but, on the contrary, are guaranteed by the constitution
as rights and
freedoms that belong from birth.
He
also appealed his
incarceration in the courtroom inasmuch as he had not
obstructed justice and
did not plan to run away. "Since the court's sentence has not
taken
effect, then my guilt has still not been proved and there is
no basis to keep
me in custody," Shpakovsky noted.
We
recall that
Gennady Shpakovsky was found guilty on 9 June of creating and
financing a
forbidden organization and he was sentenced to 6.5 years in a
penal colony of
general regime.
The
prosecutor's
office had asked for the longest term in the history of modern
Russia for
Gennady Shpakovsky—7.5 years imprisonment. He did not
acknowledge his guilt and
he stressed, while delivering his final word in the Pskov city
court, that he
was being convicted purely for his faith. (tr. by PDS, posted
3 August 2020)
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