Perm Regional Court. Photo source: AndreyIGOSHEV / CC BY-SA 3.0
On Monday, the Perm Regional Court Will Consider the Complaint of Aleksey Metsger On a Criminal Conviction For Faith
Perm TerritoryOn January 13, 2020, the Perm Regional Court will hold an appeal hearing on the complaint of Alexei Metzger, who was found guilty two months ago under a criminal article for his faith (with a fine of 350 thousand rubles). The meeting starts at 9:30 local time. Court address: Perm, Ekaterininskaya str., 33.
Earlier, on November 14, 2019, the Ordzhonikidze District Court found this resident of Perm guilty under Part 2 of Article 282.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (participation in extremist activities). The accusation is based on two episodes that the investigation considered evidence of "extremist activity": a lecture on a biblical topic and a private conversation in the apartment of one of the believers. At the same time, other participants in the events, including prosecution witnesses, testified at the trial that they had not heard any extremist statements or calls for illegal actions from the defendant.
"The verdict is subject to cancellation, since the court unreasonably recognized as a crime my peaceful actions to practice my unbanned religion of Jehovah's Witnesses," Alexei Metzger said in his complaint. The believer hopes that the court of appeal will be able to restore justice in this case.