Case of Shmidt in Sevastopol

FSB officer A. A. Dmitrienko makes inquiries and establishes that Igor Schmidt, together with other believers, takes part in religious services, which is interpreted as "organizing the activities of a banned religious organization."

Senior Investigator for Particularly Important Cases of the Investigative Directorate of the FSB of Russia for the Republic of Crimea and the City of Sevastopol S. A. Bosiyev initiates a criminal case against Igor Schmidt on suspicion of organizing the activities of an extremist organization under Part 1 of Article 282.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.

The Leninsky District Court of Sevastopol sends Igor Schmidt to pre-trial detention center No. 1 of Russia in the Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol.

The Court of Appeal changes the measure of restraint for a believer to house arrest. He spent about 6 months in the pre-trial detention center.

The materials of the criminal case of Igor Schmidt are received by the Gagarinsky District Court of the city of Sevastopol.

The first court hearing in the case of Igor Schmidt is underway. Listeners who come to support the believer are allowed into the hall.

Judge Lyudmila Tumaykina rejects the accused's petition to mitigate the measure of restraint from house arrest to prohibition of certain actions and satisfies the request to familiarize herself with the materials of the criminal case. Schmidt remains under house arrest until at least September 30, 2021 inclusive.

The court is questioning two witnesses. None of them can confirm that Jehovah's Witnesses voiced calls inciting religious hatred against other religions. They have never heard believers urge them to disobey the authorities or to refuse to perform their civic duties. The men interrogated by the court admit that the believers did not force them to attend services or to make donations. When asked whether they noticed any aggression or bitterness at meetings of Jehovah's Witnesses, the interrogated respondents reply that the believers, on the contrary, "treated each other humanly, with understanding."

In the Gagarinsky District Court, the debate of the parties begins. Igor Schmidt speaks about the prosecution witness Sergey Korkushko, who previously testified against Viktor Stashevskiy, who was sentenced to 6.5 years in prison: "[He] is not known to me or to other witnesses as a person who has ever attended Christian services of Jehovah's Witnesses, but he is known as a provocateur who is used by the FSB to illegally and shamefully persecute Jehovah's Witnesses in Sevastopol. This witness gives knowingly false and contradictory testimony. Also, these testimonies are word for word identical to the testimony of FSB officer Dmitrienko, which indicates their falsification.

"All the materials in the case prove exclusively that I belong to the religion of Jehovah's Witnesses, which has not been banned in Russia by any court," Schmidt adds.

The prosecutor asks the court to sentence the believer to 7 years in a penal colony.

Judge Lyudmila Tumaykina found the believer guilty and sentenced him to 6 years in prison in a penal colony.

Sevastopol City Court (Sevastopol, Suvorov Street, 20). The hearing has been postponed to January 13, 2022.