{"id":983,"date":"2020-02-27T21:08:34","date_gmt":"2020-02-27T19:08:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rusojuz.lv\/en\/?p=983"},"modified":"2020-03-25T21:37:23","modified_gmt":"2020-03-25T19:37:23","slug":"15-years-in-prison-for-the-enemy-of-the-state-the-trial-of-yury-alekseyev-started-in-riga","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rusojuz.lv\/en\/15-years-in-prison-for-the-enemy-of-the-state-the-trial-of-yury-alekseyev-started-in-riga\/","title":{"rendered":"15 Years in Prison for the \u201cEnemy of the State\u201d: The Trial of Yury Alekseyev Started in Riga"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cI am a diverse defendant \u2013 in my trial there are criminal charges for inciting national enmity and hatred, for possession of ammunition, and even child pornography. All these absurd accusations I completely deny,\u201d<\/em>\u00a0said Yury Alekseyev<\/h2>\n

The trial of the editor-in-chief of the Latvian website \u201cimhoclub.lv\u201d\u00a0Yury Alekseyev\u00a0started in the P\u0101rdaugava City Court on the street with the telling name Maz\u0101 Nomet\u0146u \u2013 \u201cLittle Camp\u201d. About 30 people supporting the journalist, friends, and colleagues who work at different media agencies came to \u0100genskalns for the trial, which was initially declared open. Unquestionably, Alekseyev is one of the boldest journalists in Latvia. He continued to work according to his beliefs, even though the amendments to the Criminal Law adopted in 2015 could use the article on \u201canti-state activities\u201d against almost everyone holding a different view than that of the authorities.<\/p>\n

Political amendments to the Criminal Law were actively lobbied by the State Security Service of Latvia. Although article 100 of the Latvian Constitution, which guarantees freedom of speech in the Republic, has not disappeared from the basic law of the country, criminal articles with the phrase\u00a0\u201cespionage\u201d<\/em>,\u00a0\u201cactivities against the sovereignty of the Latvian Republic\u201d<\/em>, etc., against many residents of our country are currently in the proceedings of the SBS. Remember Stalin\u2019s 58th article, which horrified everyone from liberals to nationalists? Now the legitimacy of political repression is enshrined in article 80 in the Criminal Law of Latvia, under which, and not only theoretically, any resident and even tourist on the territory of the country can fall.<\/p>\n

Shameful process<\/h2>\n

Yury Alekseyev is the subject of two criminal trials, in which six articles of the Criminal Law are combined. The judge of the P\u0101rdaugava Court Vanagi, Prosecutor Brok, and lawyer Jansone began consideration of the first trial on February 25th, in which the investigation was fully completed. The charges against Alekseyev are brought under the following articles of the Criminal Law:<\/p>\n

Article. 233:\u00a0\u201cIllicit manufacture, acquisition, storage, and sale of weapons, ammunition, and explosives\u201d<\/em>. In this case, the prosecutor of the trial, Mrs. Brok, considers proven the discovery by the SGB during the search of the defendant\u2019s apartment of ammunition for a Makarov 9 mm pistol, which was in a cache in a bulb enclosure. The maximum penalty in part 2 of this article is up to five years of imprisonment;<\/p>\n

Article. 78:\u00a0\u201cActions deliberately aimed at inciting national or racial enmity or discord\u201d<\/em>. The penalty ceiling, also under part 2 of this article, is imprisonment for up to 10 years. It is clear that this charge is directly related to the professional activities of the accused; Yury Alekseyev, it is worth admitting, has never been a conformist and has not expressed his loyalty to the \u201csuccess story of Latvia\u201d, as it is said in most media. On the contrary, he is characterised by harsh sarcasm in criticising the domestic and foreign policy of the Latvian state. But did the defendant knowingly cause enmity or discord? And did he agitate at all? These questions are to be answered by Judge Vanagi.<\/p>\n

Article. 166:\u00a0\u201cPossession of pornographic material that describes or depicts the sexual use of children, sexual acts of people with animals, necrophilia or pornographic violence, and possession of such material for the same purpose\u201d<\/em>. This article is particularly puzzling \u2013 knowing Alekseyev for more than 20 years as a person, certainly with absolutely healthy priorities, repeatedly married, and not indifferent to women, what can child pornography be? According to the defendant\u2019s lawyer Imma Jansone, these materials were found by the SGB experts on the hard disk of Alekseyev\u2019s computer a year after the search and seizure of the disk \u2013 perhaps they were put on the drive by the SGB.<\/p>\n

These are only the first three articles of the first trial against Alekseyev.<\/p>\n

In the second trial, concerning which the SGB has not yet completed the investigation, there are also three criminal episodes, including suspicion under part one of article 80 of the Criminal Code of Latvia and part two \u2013 \u201cActivities against the Republic of Latvia\u201d. The Latvian Saeima amended this article as a matter of urgency in spring 2016. The Parliamentary Commission on National Security, led at that time by Solvita \u0100bolti\u0146a, pointed to the need for urgent\u00a0\u201cchanges in legal regulation in accordance with modern challenges\u201d<\/em>, namely the criminalisation of anti-state actions in the format of\u00a0\u201chybrid and information warfare\u201d<\/em>. Under paragraph 2 of article 80 alone Alekseyev can receive a sentence of 15 years in prison. He has 6 different articles!<\/p>\n

\u201cOn November 18th 2018 the SBS searched my house, I\u2019ve been on a no-fly list for almost a year, and three times a week I have to be registered in the police department. I also have no right to publish articles on the imhoclub.lv website. The investigation in the case \u2018I vs. State\u2019 can be carried out under legislation for 22 months, then extended for 3 months \u2013 and I have not seen the SBS once since the search. The guys do not hurry. The most important thing is not to jail people in accordance with the law, the most important thing is fear,\u201d<\/em>\u00a0says Yury Alekseyev.<\/p>\n

From porn to animals: how disloyalty is snapped in Latvia<\/h3>\n

The trial started with a slight delay. Quite unexpectedly, Judge Vanagi ruled that the trial would be closed. Motivation \u2013 in the materials of the investigation there are pornographic materials, the public dissemination of which is unacceptable for the morality of society. According to the defender Jansone, this article is introduced in the case of Alekseyev, it is possible that the process was closed. The same opinion is held by Professor\u00a0Aleksandr Gaponenko, also accused by the SBS on a number of articles \u2013 from state treason to bestiality.<\/p>\n

\u201cAccording to the investigation materials, Alekseyev has \u2018child porn\u2019, while I have \u2018bestiality\u2019 for diversity. I love animals, but not as fabricated in my case. And my case also includes an article on treason. In the 800-page folder of my case there are materials about my trip to Moscow as an observer of the Russian presidential election. The conclusion there is made by SGB investigator Regelis and Prosecutor Skalbe that I am guilty. Skalbe never called me for questioning at least on the fact of the torture that I was subjected to after my arrest,\u201d<\/em>\u00a0says Gaponenko.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

The only political force that stood on the side of Alekseev was the Russian Union of Latvia party.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe criminal trials of Alekseyev, Gaponenko,\u00a0Linderman, and\u00a0Burak\u00a0are clearly political,\u201d\u00a0<\/em>said to Sputnik the Chairman of the Latvian Russian Union Miroslav Mitrofanov.\u00a0\u201cThese processes have nothing to do with democracy and freedom of speech. Obviously, the SGB in the trial of Alekseyev does not need openness of the process. He was accused of possessing child pornography in order to throw mud at him and hide the process behind closed doors. Prosecutor Brok didn\u2019t want to be laughed at.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

The witnesses of Alekseyev were removed from the courtroom, the witness from the prosecution Marek Zhuravlev did not appear at 36 Maz\u0101 Nomet\u0146u at all.<\/p>\n

The next hearing of the court concerning the case of Alekseyev will take place on May 26th.<\/p>\n

As the defendant himself said, he waited a long time for the process to begin, tired of being in conditions that limited his professional and human freedom \u2013 and although, theoretically, 15 years of jail are ahead of him, it is better than obscurity.<\/p>\n

Source: Stalker Zone (https:\/\/www.stalkerzone.org\/15-years-in-prison-for-the-enemy-of-the-state-the-trial-of-yury-alekseyev-started-in-riga\/)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cI am a diverse defendant \u2013 in my trial there are criminal charges for inciting national enmity and hatred, for possession of ammunition, and even child pornography. All these absurd accusations I completely deny,\u201d\u00a0said Yury Alekseyev The trial of the editor-in-chief of the Latvian website \u201cimhoclub.lv\u201d\u00a0Yury Alekseyev\u00a0started in the P\u0101rdaugava City Court on the street […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":984,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[62],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-983","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rusojuz.lv\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/983","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rusojuz.lv\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rusojuz.lv\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rusojuz.lv\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rusojuz.lv\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=983"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/rusojuz.lv\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/983\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":987,"href":"https:\/\/rusojuz.lv\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/983\/revisions\/987"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rusojuz.lv\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/984"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rusojuz.lv\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=983"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rusojuz.lv\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=983"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rusojuz.lv\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=983"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}