A court in Vinnytsia, a city 270 kilometers southwest from Kyiv, sentenced local activist Yuriy Pavlenko to 4.5 years in prison for hooliganism with a use of a weapon. Pavlenko denies the charges, saying that he is being punished for publicly tearing up the portrait of Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko during a protest action.
He called the sentence “a political order,” according to reports in the local media in Vinnytsia.
Pavlenko was arrested on Dec. 8, 2014, after he participated in a two-day-long protest action near the building of Vinnytsia Oblast State Administration.
The activists protested to stop the Oblast Council from dismissing its head Serhiy Svytko, who was brought to power in the wake of the EuroMaidan Revolution.
According to some media reports, the activists used stun grenades and broke into the building, interrupting the council’s meeting. At the same time, other media reported that the protesters entered the building peacefully.
One video, published on YouTube on Dec. 6, 2014, shows Pavlenko holding a portrait of Poroshenko. Together with other activists, Pavlenko shouts: “Poroshenko is not my president,” and “Porokh (Poroshenko) is a d**khead.” Then he is seen tearing up the portrait and throwing it to the ground.
According to Pavlenko’s defense lawyer Oleksiy Bonyuk, at first prosecutors accused Pavlenko of organizing of the riot and participating in it. However, later they changed the charges, as “they agreed there was no riot at all.”
Bonyuk called the trial “nonsense,” claiming that the prosecutors lacked evidence to prove that Pavlenko had any weapon or conducted any hooliganism at all.
In his words, the only evidence the court received was the video of Pavlenko tearing up Poroshenko’s portrait. He also said that the court did not hear out any of the 20 witnesses suggested by the defense.
The Prosecutor’s Office of Vinnytsia denied a suggestion that the trial of Pavlenko had anything to do with him tearing up the portrait.
The allegation is reinforced by Vinnytsia’s special place in Poroshenko’s career. He owns a large confectionary factory in the city and was elected to Ukrainian parliament in Vinnytsia with 70 percent of the votes in 2012. His elder son, Oleksiy Poroshenko, used to be a member of the Vinnytsia City Council.
Bonyuk said that one other participant of the protest has also been under investigation, but he wasn’t arrested, while Pavlenko has spent 16 months in pre-trial detention.
“Because the other protester didn’t tear up the president’s portrait,” the lawyer told the Kyiv Post.
Now the defense prepares to file an appeal.
“We will go as far as to the European Court of Human Rights,” Bonyuk said.
According to the Ukrainian legislation, the 16 months that Pavlenko spent in the pre-trial jail will be counted as 2.5 years in prison. Therefore, Pavlenko has two more years to serve.
Kyiv Post staff writer Alyona Zhuk can be reached at [email protected]
