Case History
After a series of searches in Vladivostok in March 2023, three of Jehovah’s Witnesses were detained and placed in a temporary detention facility. Two days later, Yegor Pogrebnyak was released under house arrest, and Yuriy Byche and Sergey Novoselov were sent to a pre-trial detention center. The believers initiated a criminal case under an extremist article. A little later in the same month, Tatyana Kazakova, Marina Roslova, Alina Tkachenko, Anastasiya Dyldina and Yelena Romanova became defendants in the case. In December of the same year, after new searches, Kirill Chekolayev was arrested. He spent about 5 months in the pre-trial detention center, and Novoselov and Byche spent almost a year. All three were released under a ban on certain actions. In April 2025, charges were brought against two more believers: Anatoliy Baranov and Kirill Krymskiy. In the same month, Baranov, Krymskiy, Dyldina and Pogrebnyak were charged with another article — financing extremist activities.