Kyiv’s Shevchenkivsky Court released but placed under house arrest two members of a group of hired thugs who were engaged in violence on Feb. 18, 2014, during the EuroMaidan Revolution that ousted President Viktor Yanukovych.
The two men are suspected in a murder attempt against six activists in central Kyiv.
Valeryi Smirnov, a prosecutor in the case against Oleh Heban and Serhiy Kostenko, said they used an assault rifle and a gun in an attempt to kill the protesters.
“They did everything (to kill) – they shot from all kinds of weapons in the peaceful protesters,” Smirnov told the Kyiv Post in a phone conversation. “But fortunately no one was killed.”
He said the suspects could be sentenced to life in prison if convicted.
The attempts happened on the same night and at the same location where the journalist Vyacheslav Veremiy was killed during the EuroMaidan Revolution. But it happened at a different time, according to the prosecutor.
Veremiy, who worked for Vesti newspaper journalist, was on his way home from work when he was pulled out of the taxi, beaten up with bats and shot. Veremiy died in a hospital from his injuries.
The ruling regarding Heban and Kostenko was adopted on Dec. 26 by the group of judges, including Oleh Linnyk, who earlier issued a suspended sentence against Yuriy Krysin, the leader of the group suspected of Veremiy’s killing.
Krysin, who confessed he was paid to organize a thugs group, got a four-year suspended sentence and two-years probation, although the prosecutors requested a six-year term in prison. He was tried for hooliganism, not murder, and denied that his actions had led to the death of Veremiy. The prosecutors plan to appeal the court’s decision.
Krysin’s sentence triggered a rally, where some 150 protesters demanded a harsher sentence on Dec. 25.
Smirnov, a prosecutor in the case against Heban and Kostenko, said the two groups of thugs – his suspects and Krysin – acted at the same time, but not together.
The case against Heban and Kostenko was in the trial since January 2016. Smirnov said the sentence was presumably changed because the suspects have already spent two and a half years in prison without being convicted. For suspects imprisoned until May, one day in a pre-detention facility is counted as two, based on the changes to the Criminal Code. Thus, the suspects had spent five years in prison and the court had to change the restrictions.
Another suspect in this case, Hennadiy Pohribnyi, has been released under house arrest early this year before Smirnov took the case.
Smirnov said the trial was delayed because of the juries. One juror rarely showed up, while another one refused to participate and the court had to call a new jury and restart the process.
Kostenko and Heban were ordered to wear an electronic bracelet, not to leave Kyiv without permission, not to communicate with the prosecution witnesses, and surrender foreign passports.
Smirnov disagrees with the court’s ruling, but the prosecutors are not allowed to appeal it, unless they violate the house arrest restrictions.
