The shambles that is the “trial” of Russian punk band Pussy Riot continues to its inevitable conclusion.
Surely the defence lawyer overstates when he says that trials were fairer in Stalin’s time—that’s wild—but this disgraceful bit of juridical theatre is proof that nothing much has really changed on the legal side of things in Russia.
True, in the old days, “for nothing you get ten years,” but today a mild political act can get you seven. Three punk rockers are undergoing a good, old-fashioned show trial in Moscow for an impromptu act of musical defiance in a Russian Orthodox church.
Defending themselves against the well-worn charge of “hooliganism” appears to be virtually impossible in this court:
In one week, Syrova has refused to hear nearly all the objections brought by the defence. One objection claimed that exactly the same spelling errors were found in several witness statements, implying they were falsified.
The prosecution was allowed to call all its witnesses, mainly people who were inside the church at the time of the performance or who had viewed a video of it on YouTube.
…The defence, meanwhile, tried to call 13 witness, including opposition leader Alexey Navalny and celebrated novelist Lyudmila Ulitskaya. Syrova only allowed them to call three. The prosecution launched the questioning of all its witnesses with the same question: Are you an Orthodox believer? When the defence tried to ask the same question of one of its three witnesses, Syrova shouted: “Question stricken.”
Indeed, the jarring resonances of the ancien régime are everywhere apparent. For example, the three women are allegedly mentally ill:
[A] panel of experts diagnosed all three defendants with personality disorders based on their “activist” stances, “desire for self-realization,” “overstated self-esteem,” and tendency to voice their opinions.
At least we were spared “sluggishly progressing schizophrenia.”
The women have been deliberately deprived of sleep and food. When a bomb scare led to the evacuation of the courtroom, they were left where they were.
Perhaps getting a sense of the growing international and domestic reaction to this scandalous proceeding, Emperor Vlad Putin has publicly called for leniency—a clear signal to his bench-puppet to impose something less than the maximum seven years. Naturally he will wear the mantle of a merciful leader for such a pronouncement. But it doesn’t mean the women, who have already been in jail for five months, and two of whom are mothers of young children, are going home to their families anytime soon.
Up-to-date information here. A simply excellent background article here.
