On Monday, December 16, the so-called Yalta City Court” began to re-examine the criminal case of the Crimean Tatar Yunus Masharipov, who was sentenced to 4 years in prison last year and fined 110,000 rubles for the manufacture and storage of explosives. The aforementioned was reported by the Crimean Solidarity public association.
l against the verdict. In November last year, the so-called Yalta City Court sentenced Masharipov to 4 years in jail alongside with a fine of 110,000 rubles under part 1 of Article 223.1 (“Illegal manufacture of an explosive device”), part 1 of Article 222.1 (“illegal acquisition, storage and carrying explosives or explosive devices”) of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.
The defense of Yunus Masharipov declared his innocence.
“Now the trial stage is at the very beginning of the judicial investigation. The defense fully supports mister Masharipov, since when studying the case, we came to the conclusion that his guilt was not proved. Given these circumstances, I believe that in the future it is necessary to prove his innocence initially in the court of first instance”,- said the appointed lawyer Serhii Misiuk from the Yalta Bar Association”, – reports the Crimean Solidarity public association.
He also said that the trial will resume only after one month – in January.
According to activists, earlier this year, doctors of the Crimean Republican Psychiatric Hospital recognized Masharipov as insane. In this regard, the lawyer did not exclude that in the future he would apply for an alternative or repeated psychiatric examination in relation to his client.
Masharipov himself, according to the defender, periodically complains of headaches, as well as pain in other parts of the body. Previously, he claimed beatings and electrocution by the FSB of Crimea.
We remind that on September 27, 2017, unknown individuals attacked Yalta's Yunus Masharipov. They beat him and then brought him to the FSB administration building in Yalta, where he was interrogated about his frequent trips to mainland Ukraine.
A criminal case was opened against him on charges of manufacturing explosive devices, which, according to the case materials, Yunus Masharipov made himself and transported them to a site on the Sevastopol highway, 50 meters from the Church of the Holy Archangel Michael of the Russian Orthodox Church, located in the village of Oreanda near Yalta. With their help, he allegedly planned to set a forest in Yalta on fire in order to “destabilize the socio-political situation in the region.”
On September 27, 2017, the so-called Yalta Court arrested Masharipov. During the hearing, the defendant claimed he was tortured, but no court reaction followed. Masharipov refused to testify under Article 51 of the Constitution.
In a statement that he transmitted from the Crimea pre-trial detention center in 2017, he said that since 2014 he had been engaged in human rights activities, reporting NGOs about violations of the rights of children, disabled and elder people. After that, Masharipov was beaten, tortured and electrocuted. The activist described in detail in the letter that he had to incriminate himself. In the testimony that, according to Masharipov, was obtained under torture, he indicated that he was “an agent of the Security Service of Ukraine and carried out their tasks.” He was forced to repeat the testimony under camera, while taking several recordings”. He sent the text of the statement to the then president of Ukraine – Petro Poroshenko and the ex-head of the FSB Directorate for the Crimea and Sevastopol Viktor Palahin. On December 1, 2017, this information was published by a number of Ukrainian and Russian sources.
The Memorial Human Rights Center recognized Yunus Masharirov as a political prisoner.