Lutyev sentenced to 8 years

On 13 July the Sevastopol Appeal Court, presided over by Judge Yevhen Solovyev, passed sentence on Volodymyr Lutyev, the Chief Editor of “Yevpatoriyskaya nedellya”.

Volodymyr Lutyev was sentenced to 8 years deprivation of liberty with confiscation of property. The court also ordered the journalist to pay 100 thousand UH in compensation to the claimant.

After the verdict was announced, Lutyev said that he would be making an appeal to the Supreme Court since he believed that the court verdict had been commissioned.

The claimant was not present when the verdict was read out since he is wanted for questioning by the police in connection with two criminal cases.

At the beginning of November 2003 the journalist was arrested on suspicion of having organized the murder of Mykola Kotlyarevsky, a Deputy of the Crimean Parliament.

The investigation into this case lasted for several years. In 2003, after protest from journalists’ organizations and the Ombudsperson, the court released Lutyev on a written undertaking not to leave the area, but in May 2005 he was remanded in custody again. He has been imprisoned since then. Many experts and lawyers believe that the case against the journalist who exposed abuses in the law enforcement agencies in his newspaper was set up..

http://maidan.org.ua/static/news/2006/1152702625.html

more details can be found in Human Rights in Ukraine – 2005  http://khpg.org/1151682148=