Verdict*

A “demonstratively unlawful” decision

/ editors (JC)

Interviewed this morning on Echo Moskvy radio station, DMITRIEV’s defence attorney Victor Anufriev since December 2016 said he would appeal against the new sentence.

… this sentence, in my view, is demonstratively unlawful. This is the THIRD time there has been a judicial hearing, and it’s the only occasion on which the court totally ignored every one of my petitions, including those aimed at securing evidence which proved Yury Dmitriev’s innocence.

One hundred per cent (100%) of my petitions were rejected. In other words, the court moved towards a predefined goal and clearly favoured the prosecution.”

Echo Moskvy, 28 December 2021
(10.38 am Moscow Time)

“I’m a tough old fellow …

/ editors (JC)

I know a thing or two …” said DMITRIEV in a letter (see below) the day before the new sentence was announced.

DMITRIEV chats briefly with his lawyers Victor Anufriev and Roman Masalyov; video taken by Nikita Girin for Novaya gazeta.

Dmitriev’s words quoted above come from a letter he wrote to journalist Zoya Svetova. She received it on 26 December 2021. There he also said that in his Last Words to the court he declared he was proud to be a member of Memorial.

This very night

/ editors (JC)

DMITRIEV’s friends and supporters from Moscow and Petersburg and his defence attorney Victor Anufriev are travelling north to Petrozavodsk to hear the announcement later this morning, writes Alla Shmaina-Velikanova.

Meanwhile, In Petrozavodsk Yury DMITRIEV and his family and friends are waiting for the morning. So are the city’s devout old men and women, outside the courthouse door in the frost.

Judge Khomyakova is also waiting for the dawn. Is she sleeping? What dreams does she see? Or is she awake?