Petrozavodsk*

Same charges, same court

/ editors (JC)

For a third time Yury DMITRIEV is on trial in Petrozavodsk, before a different judge and prosecutor. There has been a second attempt to replace Yury DMITRIEV’s defence attorney Victor Anufriev.

On Friday, 2 April 2021, the third trial of Yury Dmitriev was resumed at the Petrozavodsk City Court (the proceedings were halted for several months while the Third Cassation Court in St Petersburg considered the case). Two times the Karelian High Court has rejected favourable verdicts by the court in Petrozavodsk and returned the charges for re-examination.

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A solitary protest in Petrozavodsk

/ editors (JC)

Saturday, 6 February 2021

Despite a daytime temperature of minus 16 degrees Centigrade, Vladimir Malegin went and stood at the University bus stop on Student Boulevard in Petrozavodsk, a solitary picket in support of Yury DMITRIEV.

Malegin’s placard reads: “Freedom for the political prisoner Dmitriev!”

Someone sitting in a vehicle parked by the main building of Petrozavodsk University saw Malegin and started making a call, evidently, to his superiors. A few minutes later the police arrived. A policeman talked to Malegin, heard him out and left.

Posted on Facebook by Andriy Litvin

Round Three: November 2020

/ editors (JC)

Next week the charges against Yury DMITRIEV will be examined, once again, in the Petrozavodsk City Court. The first hearing in the new trial is scheduled for Tuesday, 24 November (on the court’s website it was announced that the trial would begin on Wednesday, 18 November, but the later date was agreed and confirmed with Dmitriev’s defence).

This will be the third time Yury Dmitriev has been put on trial for the same crimes. Twice the Petrozavodsk City Court has found the historian not guilty of preparing child pornography or committing depraved acts against his foster daughter. On a further charge of illegal possession of a firearm he was found guilty in 2018, but acquitted in 2020.

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Hearing goes ahead — without Anufriev

/ editors (JC)

The hearing at Karelia’s High Court of defence and prosecution appeals against the 22 July verdict in the DMITRIEV trial will go ahead tomorrow despite the absence of Victor Anufriev, the attorney who has led Dmitriev’s defence since December 2016. Postponed for a week at Anufriev’s request (he is self-isolating), the hearing will begin at 10 am on Tuesday, 22 September at 27 Kirov Street in Petrozavodsk.

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A Time to Speak Out

/ editors (JC)

Today the Supreme Court of Karelia is hearing appeals from prosecution and defence against the verdict pronounced at Yury DMITRIEV’s trial on 22 July this year.

The prosecution has slightly “softened” its demands: now it is asking not for 15 but 13 years’ imprisonment. The defence, as before, demands that Dmitriev be cleared of all charges.

We must stand together today, in thought and word and deed, and say: No, we have not given up, we have not shut up and gone away, we are NOT happy with this verdict, even if it is the best possible in the circumstances. Our banner reads “Not Guilty!”

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