Sergey Melnikov
- Criminal Code
- Article 282.2 part 2, Russian Criminal Code
- Case category
- Extremism casesCases against Jehovah's Witnesses
- Verdict
- Suspended prison sentence, Restriction of liberty
- Sentence
- 3 years
- Date of verdict
- 2022-02-02
- Region
- Primorsky Krai
- City
- Ussuriysk
Recognition by human rights organisations
- Recognised as unlawfully deprived of liberty for exercising freedom of religionby Union of Solidarity with Political Prisoners, 8 January 2020
This is the assessment of the organisation named above, not ours. FACTUM reports it with attribution and does not make its own.
Case summary
On 5 June 2019, he was detained in his own car while talking to a man who, according to Jehovah's Witnesses, was "leading him into conversations about faith". Melnikov's home was searched. The court sent him to custody. On 4 October he was transferred to house arrest. Initially he was accused of organising the activities of an extremist organisation but in February 2020 the charge was reclassified to participation in the activities of an extremist organisation. At the same time Melnikov was released from house arrest on his own recognisance. In March, it became known that the prosecutor's office returned the case for further investigation. On 3 February 2022, he was sentenced to three years' suspended sentence.
Others charged under Article 282.2 part 2, Russian Criminal Code
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Source: this person’s record in the OVD-Info political persecution database
Published under CC BY 3.0. The criteria for treating a person as politically persecuted belong to OVD-Info; FACTUM relays their assessment and makes none of its own.
OVD-Info has been designated an «extremist» organisation in Russia — by decision of the Russian authorities, like other independent human rights and media projects.