Appeal in Blagoveshchensk Mitigated the Punishment for Pensioner Vladimir Balabkin and Released Him from Custody

On December 19, 2023, the Amur Regional Court released 71-year-old Vladimir Balabkin from custody. The court reclassified his actions from Part 1 (organization of extremist activity) to Part 2 (participation in such) of Article 282.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation and imposed 1 year of suspended imprisonment. He had spent 96 days in a pre-trial detention center.

A panel of three judges chaired by Natalya Trofimova considered an appeal against the verdict of the court of first instance, which found Vladimir Balabkin guilty under Part 1 of Article 282.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. The milder second part of the same article made it possible to reclassify the actions of the believer and release him from custody in the courtroom. His sentence is considered suspended.

Three months earlier, the judge of the first instance of the Belogorsk City Court, Natalya Kramar, sentenced an elderly believer with deafness and a serious stomach disease to 4 years in prison. Immediately after the verdict was announced, Vladimir was arrested in the courtroom, and before the appeal he was in pre-trial detention center No. 1 in the Amur Region.

The believer disagreed with the guilty verdict, found many violations in it and appealed. He drew attention to the fact that it was impossible to establish from the verdict on what basis the court considered the regular worship of Jehovah's Witnesses as a continuation of the activities of an extremist organization. According to the explanation of the Supreme Court, it is allowed to practice the religion of Jehovah's Witnesses in Russia.

Balabkin also stressed that the verdict was passed in violation of international law: "For example, the court did not apply the provisions of Article 18 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, according to which everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion. This right includes ... freedom to manifest one's religion and belief, either alone or in community with others and in public or private."

In the Amur Region, 13 of Jehovah's Witnesses have already received from 6 to 8 years in a general regime colony for participating in worship services.