This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.
Artist News Legal Top Stories
Pussy Riot to appeal, lawyer fears prison attack
By CMU Editorial | Published on Wednesday 22 August 2012
Nikolai Polozov, a member of the defence team working for Pussy Riot members Maria Alyokhina, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Yekaterina Samutsevich, has said that his clients will appeal against their sentence within two weeks, the Guardian reports.
As previously reported, the women were last week found guilty of “hooliganism motivated by religious hatred” after protesting against Vladimir Putin in a church earlier this year. They were sentenced to two years in prison, taking into account the five months they had already served while awaiting trial.
Polozov also said that he fears for the women’s safety while they are in jail, saying: “For half a year, state-run television has built up a very negative image of them – that they’re blasphemers, heretics. The only source of information in prisons is state-run TV. We have a serious basis to think they can be faced with physical harm, moral pressure and even violence”.
According to Reuters, Russian police have also said that they are still searching for the other members of the band, another two of whom were involved in the church protest.
