Another Conviction of One of Jehovah's Witnesses in Kamchatka. Believer, 45, Received Six Years Suspended

On February 26, 2025, the judge of the Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky City Court, Aleksandr Kotkov, recognized Aleksey Ovchar's peaceful religious activities as "a crime against the constitutional order of the state" and sentenced him to a long suspended sentence.

Aleksey Ovchar faced criminal prosecution in 2022 at the same time as his fellow believers, Sergey and Yelena Chechulin. The believer was included in the list of extremists of Rosfinmonitoring, his bank accounts were blocked. Later, Aleksey's case was separated into a separate proceeding. In October 2024, the Investigative Committee began an investigation, and a month later the case went to court.

Much of the evidence obtained during the investigation did not directly concern Ovchar. The accusation was based on 12 recordings of conversations between believers, during most of which Aleksey was not present. Also, as the believer noted, the expert opinion in the case was carried out with numerous violations. Despite this, the prosecutor requested 6.5 years in prison for Aleksey.

At one of the court hearings, Ovchar said: "I believe that the investigation is misled and mistakenly claims that my peaceful actions in practicing religion are a continuation of the activities of an extremist organization. [...] I had every right to discuss the Bible and communicate with my fellow believers."

In total, 11 Jehovah's Witnesses are persecuted in the Kamchatka Territory. Eight of them were convicted.