Taganrog: case of 16 Jehovah's Witnesses sent to court

The indictment against 16 members of the religious organization of Jehovah's Witnesses, accused of extremism, has been sent to the court. Alyona Borodina, one of the advocates, told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent about it.

"On Friday, April 12, the indictment on 20 volumes of the Taganrog case was given out to the defendants; and now the case is sent to the court," said Borodina.

According to her story, all the defendants petitioned for a preliminary hearing, believing that the accusations against the believers are untenable - the case lacks the corpus delicti, the advocates had stated. For the same reason all of the defendants, the representative of the minor and eight advocates petitioned, after getting acquainted with the materials of the case, about its termination.

"Both the advocate and their clients had no chance to properly study the [case materials], because there was a time limit. They had complained about it; and the appeal is pending," Victor Zhenkov, an advocate for the defendants, told the "Caucasian Knot" earlier.

He added that the investigation had treated the "normal peaceful religious activity" as a crime; and one of the defendants was accused "of reading a fragment from the Bible, the Psalms, during a religious gathering."

The date of the court hearing has not been scheduled yet.