Photo: Police officers removing the handcuffs of Vladimir Alushkin (January 2019)

Photo: Police officers removing the handcuffs of Vladimir Alushkin (January 2019)

Photo: Police officers removing the handcuffs of Vladimir Alushkin (January 2019)

Criminal Investigation and Trial

4 believers were transferred from the pre-trial detention center to house arrest

Penza Region,   Khabarovsk Territory,   Primorye Territory

Vladimir Alushkin in Penza, Vitaliy Zhuk and Nikolay Polevodov in Khabarovsk and Valentin Osadchuk in Vladivostok left the pre-trial detention center.

On January 14, 2019, the courtroom of the first instance in Penza was filled with listeners who came to support 54-year-old Vladimir Alushkin. Unexpectedly, the court refused to allow the investigator to extend his arrest and released him from custody in the courtroom under house arrest. Vladimir Alushkin spent 184 days behind bars.

On the same day, January 14, 2019, the Khabarovsk Regional Court changed the decision of the court of first instance on the arrest of Vitaly Zhuk and Nikolai Polevodov. They were placed under house arrest. Both stayed in SIZO-1 in the Khabarovsk Territory for 66 days. The third defendant in their criminal case, Stanislav Kim, is still in jail.

Finally, on January 18, 2019, after 275 days in custody, the court of appeal decided to transfer Valentin Osadchuk, a resident of Vladivostok, to house arrest. Investigators of the FSB of Russia in the Primorsky Territory unsuccessfully tried to intimidate him. According to eyewitnesses, during his arrest in April 2018, a security officer tried to make Valentin feel sorry for himself, saying that he was "not destined to buy in the summer." In response, Valentine, without losing his sense of humor and dignity and being firmly convinced of his innocence, replied: "Well, maybe then I'll play snowballs in winter."

Case of Alushkin and Others in Penza

Case History
In July 2018, searches were carried out in Penza and criminal cases were initiated against 6 local Jehovah’s Witnesses. It turned out that since the fall of 2017, the believers had been under covert surveillance. Vladimir Alushkin spent six months in a pre-trial detention center. The UN Working Group officially recognized his arrest as arbitrary. In the summer of 2019, the case was submitted to the Leninsky District Court of Penza. During the hearings, it turned out that the protocols of the witnesses’ interrogations were partially falsified by the investigation, and one of the witnesses told the court that she had testified under pressure. In December 2019, Judge Roman Tanchenko sentenced Vladimir Alushkin to 6 years in prison, and Tatyana Alushkina, Galia Olkhova, Vladimir Kulyasov, Andrey Magliv and Denis Timoshin to 2 years suspended. In September 2020, the Penza Regional Court commuted the sentence of Vladimir Alushkin, replacing 6 years in prison with 4 years probation. For the rest, the court upheld the sentence - 2 years suspended. On December 9, 2021, the First Court of Cassation of General Jurisdiction upheld the verdict.
Timeline

Persons in case

Alushkin
Vladimir
Alushkina
Tatyana
Kulyasov
Vladimir
Magliv
Andrey
Olkhova
Galiya
Timoshin
Denis

Criminal case

Region:
Penza Region
Locality:
Penza
Suspected of:
according to the investigation he participated in religious services, which is interpreted as participating in the activity of an extremist organisation (with reference to the decision of the Russian Supreme Court on the liquidation of all 396 registered organisations of Jehovah’s Witnesses)
Court case number:
11802560015000075
Initiated:
July 11, 2018
Current case stage:
the verdict entered into force
Investigating:
Bessonovsky Interdistrict Investigative Department of the Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation for the Penza Region
Articles of Criminal Code of Russian Federation:
282.2 (1), 282.2 (2)
Court case number:
1-110/2020 (1-167/2019)
Court:
Leninskiy District Court of the City of Penza
Case History
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