May it please the court, may it please the participants of the trial:
For centuries Russia has preserved its Orthodox traditions. For more than a thousand years it has conserved and proliferated the spiritual heritage of the Orthodox faith, begat to us from the time of Holy Prince Vladimir, Sergius of Radonezh, Patriarch Tikhon. On February 21, 2012, in thirty seconds, three girls destroyed the sanctity of everything with a song prayer to the Blessed Virgin. Totally everything. Nothing is hallow!
How shameful, how shameful, how utterly shameful it is for me to listen to the arguments of the public prosecution. There’s a sense right now that we’re not in twenty-first-century Russia but in some alternate universe in a fairytale like Alice in Wonderland, like Alice Through the Looking-Glass, and right now this whole ludicrous reality will disappear and crumble like a house of cards. And three imprisoned girls will rise and return home to their families, to their children.
What is the public prosecution’s ludicrous stand? How can this circumlocution be publicly and earnestly voiced as the position of the public prosecution? From what law, code of conduct, what instructions (at the very least) did the Ministry of Justice of the Federation draw on for all of these terms: sacrilege, blasphemy, obscene songs, legs raised in a vulgar way?
Oh, of course, it’s from a letter by the sacristan of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior, Mr. Ryazantsev. It’s from a letter by members of the Council of Muftis. It’s from the Bishops’ Council and two ecumenical councils—Trulsk and Laodicean.
Metropolitan Alexy, the person the prosecution spoke of so devoutly, was not the patriarch, since he never belonged to the Russian Orthodox Church and the Cathedral of Christ the Savior. The upper temple of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior is not a part of the Orthodox Church. I’ll repeat myself, it has yet to be handed over to the Russian Orthodox Church. It is used by the Foundation of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in accordance with its liturgical objectives. But conducting church ceremonies is not a part of the liturgical function of the Foundation of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior.
However, the investigation doesn’t want to ascertain these facts. Otherwise, it would seem as though the cultural Orthodox ceremonies held in the upper temple of Christ the Savior are arbitrary. There is no consecrated place in the temple where the prayer—the punk prayer—occurred. There never was.
The upper temple of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior complex is as much an imitation of a house of religious worship as a mannequin is, for instance, an imitation of a person. There are arms, and legs, and there’s even a head, but there is no heart or life. Still, neither the investigation nor the public prosecution deemed it necessary to ascertain this; no one raised that question. And no one raised the question: Do the charges fit the crime? No one wants to establish the truth in this case, neither the investigation nor the public prosecution. Otherwise, how else can you explain to Russia and the rest of the world why for five months these women, these innocent women, have been held in custody? They were arrested; they see neither their children nor their families; they do not see the light of day; they are tortured.
What has the public prosecution charged the defendants with?
Their clothes were the wrong color. They stood in the wrong place. They didn’t pray in the proper manner. They made the sign of the cross in the wrong direction and at the wrong speed. They turned their rears to the Sacred Nail, danced, moving diabolically. They raised their legs in a vulgar way in the sacramental area of the church. I don’t misspeak—that’s exactly what’s written in the state’s indictment, read aloud to us by the prosecution. This is how easily they demolished the age-old foundations of the Orthodox faith!
I’ll focus briefly only on those procedural violations that we, the defense, have witnessed during the course of this case. While the investigatory process was being conducted, the opinions of the accused, who are now the defendants, and their defense were not once taken into account. Any questions that the defense tried to ask the accused during the investigatory process were struck by this wording: since they won’t testify, refused to cooperate with the investigation, refused to plead guilty, then they don’t have the right to ask questions.
All of the expert evaluations, conducted by the investigation, were conducted in secret, covertly. There is not one expert evaluation, from the moment the defense decided to conduct it to when a decision was reached, that was agreed upon and accepted by our defendants. It wasn’t until later, and in no rush, but after a considerable amount of time had passed after these expert evaluations were conducted that our defendants were informed of the outcomes. Accordingly, they couldn’t ask their own questions, or call into question the experts’ authority or the experts themselves who conducted the evaluations. Therefore, they could not participate equally in the investigation. This was a violation of equal rights, the adversarial system—fundamental rights according to both the Constitution and international law.
The investigation used persistently a video to build their case, which is, and everyone agrees, a compilation of several different events with a superimposed audio recording. As such, the investigation did not even try to find out who created the video, how it ended up posted on the Internet, and exactly when it happened. Why not? Because the investigation has no use for this information.
Why find answers to these questions? Why do we need expertise to be carried out with authenticity about what really and truly happened in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior? The investigation that took place was a work of fiction. Absolutely everything, including the documents pertaining to the investigation, are part of this work of fiction. Only the victims and witnesses (though not all of the witnesses) spoke of exactly what happened in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior.
We were denied adequate familiarization with the case materials. And it should embarrass anyone in this room that the court subsequently ascertained that there had been enough time. That’s not so. The criminal files included seven volumes, thirteen CDs containing video, and five data carriers containing more than one and a half terabytes of data. In order to fully familiarize ourselves with all of the material evidence and the case file at a rate of speed at which electronic information may be reviewed, we estimated that we would need ninety days of nonstop viewing to merely watch all the video files on the those data carriers in our possession, which are attached to the this criminal case.
Our defendants were never allowed to review these materials.
No one made any attempt to show them what they are accused of. What is the reason? Beside the fact that it’s impossible to show all of this material evidence in the detention center. Regulations at the detention center forbid bringing in any data carriers or any other kind of technological devices. So, by taking our defendants into custody, the investigation knew in advance that it was violating their right to have access to the case, but they did it anyway. I was not allowed to copy information from the data carriers that are in with the material evidence, data carriers seized from Alekhina, Tolokonnikova, and Peter Verzilov, Tolokonnikova`s husband. What’s more, the investigation indicates everywhere, for some reason I can’t understand, that I’m familiar with all of the material. When signing the protocol on access to the case under Article 217, I stated that I had not been provided with all of the material pertaining to the case, and that I had not been allowed to review all of the material pertaining to the case. But what followed, for some reason, was that the courts and subsequently this present court indicated in relevant motions that had been filed that I had been shown all of the material. I cannot understand why it was necessary to give false information and why, earlier, when we petitioned the court to allow us finally to review the material pertaining to this case and process, the consequence was that the public prosecution paid no attention to the flagrant violation of the law in regard to our defendants.
On the day that the protocols regarding access to material evidence were to be signed, my colleagues Polozov and Feigin were completely shut out of the detention center. When the girls were supposed to sign all of the documents, and I discussed this during the trial, it was in my presence. What’s more, it wasn’t that they were refusing to sign the corresponding protocols, they just asked, and lawfully so, that their lawyers be present. And they wrote this down on a blank piece of paper, provided to them by the investigation. After that, the corresponding protocols appeared in the case. I witnessed it myself. So don’t tell me that all of our defendants’ rights have been met. I have witnessed how the investigation forged those corresponding documents.
From the first moments of the trial—from the moment that this case went to trial and from the scheduling of the preliminary hearing in the judicial proceeding—we were not granted even one confidential meeting with our defendants. Not one! Not even an hour to meet confidentially. Saying that we can talk privately with them while in the courtroom is not true. There are always people close by, guards on duty, dogs ...
Do you think the rights of our defendants have been met?
Is this how the right to privately confer has been met?
Will the public prosecution reproach our defendants that we were not ready to conduct this trial?
We are ready, but our defendants have not had the opportunity to consult with us about the procedure of this process. And the public prosecution did everything to ensure that the rights of our defendants were violated.
Suppressive measures against our defendants are unlawful, without just cause. This is in violation of all the existing rules that relate to the documents and rulings of the Plenum of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation, which prohibit the selection of this kind of measure of restraint in cases such as these. And the European Court of Human Rights will provide answers and give their own assessment of these illegal activities. Unfortunately, it won’t be soon, but I understand with utter clarity and I’m positive of the kind of assessment it will be.
Factually, we as the defense have had no chance of providing normal, adequate, and zealous representation for our defendants. And the opportunity to do so was taken away from us by the court and the public prosecution. For the last two weeks and longer, we have bore witness to the torture and general inhumane and degrading treatment of our defendants. They were not allowed adequate sleep; they were not given enough to eat and were not provided with hot meals. They were humiliated. This, too, will find its assessment in the European Court of Human Rights. The public prosecution crossed the line and made things personal by insulting the defense on a regular basis, from one day in court to the next.
The court prevented due process of the law during the trial by not admitting witnesses and experts who had been invited to the courthouse. It engaged in shutting its doors, and this has been documented for the record by the defense. On August 3, there was an attempt to bar the press and the public from the courtroom while court was in session. This was an attempt to violate the principle of an open trial. And the public prosecution, as the side that is responsible for preserving justice in this case, paid absolutely no attention to it. They closed their eyes.
The principles of the adversarial system, the principle of equality between both parties—these fundamental rules of criminal procedure, were regularly and systematically violated during the proceedings. We perpetually spoke up about these systemic violations of the judicial process in this court every day, literally, nonstop. As a representative of the state, the public prosecution, which is obliged to be a proponent of justice during the process, did not once pay attention to the gross violations of our defendants’ rights.
Do you think that a fair trial is being conducted here?
Do you really think that this is a court of justice?
Throughout this process it was namely the state, and not the girls, who threw a knockout punch at the Russian Orthodox Church, cynically scoffing at the spiritual traditions of Orthodoxy, the commandments of the Bible. And to my great sorrow, the Russian Orthodox Church will not recover from it soon. Only hourly spiritual ministry to faith, only faith and the Lord will be able to close this gaping, festering wound that exposes a withdrawal of the Russian Orthodox Church, whose face is its primate, its senior clergy, from the spiritual sphere into the sphere of politics, into a close bond between church and state as political institutions, a withdrawal of the church from the sphere of morality, spirituality and faith into politics.
There hasn’t been a blasphemy trial in Russia in ninety-five years—not since 1917. In 2012, time turned back to the Middle Ages. Announcing its official position “The Voice of the Church,” Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin, called the patriarch a politician. However, during this entire process we witness the public prosecution’s diligent withdrawal from the political sphere to the sphere of the common criminal.
This is not a criminal case.
These women are recognized as political prisoners by international organizations such as Amnesty International, Memorial, and others. These women are not here now because they danced in church in the wrong clothes, in the wrong place, and prayed incorrectly, and made the sign of the cross the wrong way. They are here for their political beliefs. The words of the song, the words of the prayer that they performed—it is a political song, a political prayer addressed to the Blessed Virgin.
From the side I’m on, I’ve always been surprised by the position of the Russian Orthodox Church. What about the Regulations of the Russian Orthodox Church—Section 9 in particular—which prohibit the church from operating in the political sphere? Why is the patriarch called a politician?
There is no answer to this question. We see a growing union, a tandem between the state and the Russian Orthodox Church, the government’s withdrawal from the secular into clericalism. That nail, which it is sinful to turn your back on, it’s now the nail hammered into the Constitution and the law, and they are bleeding, here, in this court of justice.
The church is becoming a state institution, while the Constitution which is basic law, is increasingly being transformed into a monument. A monument that stands on the graves of law, justice, and human rights, all of which were made a mockery of in the most egregious manner, violated through the process of this trial and throughout this case.
Nothing further.
—Violetta Volkova