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The Southern District Military Court has sentenced four residents of the occupied city of Nova Kakhovka in the Kherson region to between 13 and 14 years in prison on charges of abetting terrorism (part 3 of article 205.1 of the Criminal Code). Mediazona reports.
Nataliya Kozhemyatska and Konstantin Semenyuk were each given 14 years in prison; Anastasiya Bernatska received 13 years and four months; and Pavlo Peleshchuk, 13 years. The men are required to serve the first five years of their sentence in prison, with the remainder to be served in a strict regime penal colony.
The case relates to an attempt to blow up the car of former district police officer Maksym Karyi on 10 May 2024. According to the prosecution, the accused watched him on orders from the administrator of a pro-Ukrainian chat group, whom investigators link to Ukrainian military intelligence. Investigators allege that an unknown individual planted an explosive device under Karyi’s car, but he noticed the bomb and was unharmed. While attempting to defuse the device, there was an explosion in which FSB explosives specialist Mikhail Sverdlikov was killed.
All four were detained in May 2024. According to the defendants, after their arrest they were held for six months ‘in basements’ without formal detention. In court, three of the accused said they had been tortured.
Nataliya Kozhemyatska reported that she was electrocuted and beaten on the head, and that she was raped. Pavlo Peleshchuk said he fabricated testimony so they would stop electrocuting him and beating him with a rubber baton. Konstantin Semenyuk also spoke of being beaten and tortured with electricity and water by masked men.