RELATIVES
OF DAGESTAN JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES REPORT UNPRECEDENTED SUPPORT AT
COURT
Kavkazskii
Uzel, 26 February 2020
Around
400 persons gathered today at a cassation court in Piatigorsk in
order to
express support for Jehovah's Witnesses of Dagestan who are
accused of
extremism, the spouse of one of the believers who attended the
trial reported.
The court postponed the hearing to 4 March because a video link
with the
believers from a detention cell in Mikhachkala was not
established.
Kavkazskii
Uzel has written that the four Jehovah's Witnesses of
Dagestan—Arsen Abdullaev,
Maria Karpova, Anton Dergalev, and Marat Abdulalimov—have been
in custody in a
Makhachkala SIZO since June 2019. The Soviet district court of
Makhachkala on
24 January extended their detention until 27 March. The
believers appealed this
decision. On 13 February, the Supreme Court of Dagestan reversed
it, but it did
not release the believers from custody at the time and it
remanded the case to
the court of the first instance for another consideration of the
issue of the
measure of restriction. However the outcome of the review of the
case in
district court was a new decision to leave the defendants in
custody until 27
March. In issuing its decision, the Supreme Court of Dagestan
possessed
information that the cassation court in Piatigorsk had accepted
the appeal of
Maria Karpova against the repeated extension of detention by the
court of the
first instance.
Consideration
of the cassation appeal by Maria Karpova was scheduled for
today. Relatives of
all four of the defendants attached great significance to this
event after the
explanation by the lawyers that the cassation appeal was not
automatically
accepted for consideration, but only if the court considers the
violations that
the declarer is appealing are serious. This was reflected in the
unprecedented
number in the group of supporters at the courthouse in
Piatigorsk, the wife of
one of the believers charged along with Karpova in the case
about extremism
explained to a Kavkazskii Uzel correspondent.
Around
400 persons from Volgograd, North and South Ossetia, Dagestan,
Piatigorsk,
Essentuki, Rostov-on-Don, Armavir, Georgievsk, Nalchik,
Cherkessia, Moscow, and
other cities arrived at the building of the fifth cassation
court in Piatigorsk
to support the defendants, the wife of Arsen Abdullaev (who
attended the court)
explained.
"Such
a large number of people attracted attention. People came up and
asked what kind
of trial it was. Court bailiffs were initially wary of such a
quantity of
people, but all who came behaved properly and did not disturb
order," Suat
Abdullaeva said.
About
15 persons were allowed into the courtroom for the session
beginning at 10:30
a.m., because a small room had been scheduled for consideration
of the case.
"Three judges and a prosecutor attended; there were no lawyers
for the
defendants. After waiting hours, they told us that it did not
turn out to be
possible to establish a video link with SIZO No. 1 of
Makhachkala, and the
session was postponed until 4 March," the believer's wife
explained. She
said that those present were told that it was on the Makhachkala
end that the
link failed.
The
relatives of the defendants were surprised about the session in
the Soviet
district court of Makhachkala, which on 25 February again issued
a decision to
continue the detention of believers, despite the outcome of the
appeal court
and without awaiting the position of the cassation court. The
relatives learned
that the believers had been taken to the Soviet district court
of Makhachkala
only after the start of the session. By that time, most of those
who wanted to
see the defendants and express their support for them had
already left for
Piatigorsk in order to attend the cassation court, so they were
not able to go
to the Makhachkala court, Arsen Abdullaev's wife said.
The
lawyers were not at the session in the district court by
agreement and only
appointed lawyers were present, whose service the believers had
previously rejected,
the Kavkazskii Uzel correspondent found out. At the same time,
the Kavkazskii
Uzel correspondent was told at the press service of the Soviet
court that the
trial on 25 February was open and "whoever wishes may attend and
everybody
was informed of the date of the session on time."
Only
about ten persons from among the friends and relatives of the
defendants were
able to attend the session in Makhachkala on 25 February, but
the F.S.B. agent
agreed to let them into the courthouse only in exchange for a
copy of their
passports and after issuing them a summons for interrogation.
Those who arrived
at the court to support the believers filed an appeal against
these actions
with the chairman of the court and with the prosecutor's office,
one of
the websites that reports about persecution of Jehovah's
Witnesses in Russia is
reporting. (tr. by PDS, posted 27 February 2020)
Chronology
from website of Jehovah's
Witnesses in Russia
27
May 2019: F.S.B. opens a criminal case for faith based on
article 282.2 (1);
according to the account of the investigation, several local
residents
"organized the conduct of religious meetings, of so-called
congregations,
during which they conducted with the participation of residents
of the republic
of Dagestan study of printed productions of the forbidden
organization of the
Administrative Center of Jehovah's Witnesses in Russioa. The
innocent victims
of law enforcers are Arsen Abdullaev, Maria Karpova, Anton
Dergalev, and Marat
Abdulgalimopv. The Soviet District court of Makhachkala sent
them to a SIZO for
2 months.
27 July
2019: Judge
Dalgat of the Soviet district court of Makhachkala ordered to
extend the
detention of all four believers for 2 months, until 27
September.
27
September 2019:
Prison detention of all four extended to 27 November 2019.
27
November 2019:
Prison detention of all four extended to 27 January 2019
24
January 2020:
Prison detention of all four extended to 27 March 2020.
13
February 2020:
Supreme Court of Dagestan overturned the order of the Soviet
district court
extending custody until 27 March 2020. However the court did not
release the
believers from custody, extending the term of confinement by 2
weeks (until 27
February), and remanding the case for a new consideration with a
different
court composition.
On 26
February at
10:30, the fifth cassation court of Piatigorsk will hold a
review of the
cassation appeal against previous decisions of the Dagestan
Supreme Court. Earlier
the prisoners received a response from the judge of the
cassation court which
said that the court found a number of serious violations in
their case.
25
February 2020: the
Soviet district court of Makhachkala extended the term in the
SIZO of the four
persons detained for their faith until 27 March 2020.
To
support the
believers, about 10 friends and relatives arrived at the court.
The spouse of
one of the detainees said that their relatives were not informed
of the date of
the judicial hearings, so many went to Piatigorsk, where on 26
February there
was supposed to be a hearing of the cassation instance on the
appeals against
the arrest of Maria Karpova and other prisoners. Before the
start of the trial,
an F.S.B. agent named Ignatiev did not permit anybody to enter
until he received
a copy of their passports and issued a summons for
interrogation. Those
arriving filed a complaint against these actions with the
chairman of the court
and the prosecutor's office. (tr. by PDS, posted 27 February
2020)
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