A Russian court on Thursday (December 18) convicted a Russian priest and fined him 30,000 rubles ($379) for “showing open contempt for society” after authorities beat him, shaved his hair and beard, and gave him electric shocks with a stun gun last month.
At the Slavyansk City Court in the Krasnodar region, Judge Vladimir Otoroshko handed down the verdict on an administrative complaint against Pastor Iona (Ilya) Sigida, 34, an assistant of the Holy Intercession and Tikhon Church in Slavyansk-on-Kuban, on charges of disseminating information showing open contempt for society, state institutions and national symbols.
Rights group Forum 18 reported that Judge Yulia Pelushenko placed the priest under house arrest on November 28, with his release not scheduled until January 20. This followed a violent attack by the military on the church premises on November 27, and the arrest of Sigida, who criticized Russia on the church’s website.
During questioning on November 27, Sigida said after his release that National Guard or Investigative Committee agents forcibly shaved his hair and beard, beat him, and gave him electric shocks with a stun gun.
Separately, Sigida also faces criminal charges “apparently for an article he posted on the website of the Tikhonian Church of the Holy Intercession in Slavyansk-on-Kubani, on charges that may be related to ‘blatant contempt for society about the days of military glory'” (Article 354, Paragraph 1, Part 4 of the Criminal Code), Forum 18 reported.
The Commission of Inquiry initiated two proceedings on November 20 based on this same provision. These lawsuits include articles on the church’s website criticizing how Russia celebrates Victory Day (May 9) and other Soviet Union holidays.
According to Forum 18, Sigida remains under investigation on two criminal charges of “dissemination of information expressing open contempt for society about Russia’s military glory days and anniversaries related to the defense of the Fatherland, as well as desecration of symbols of Russia’s military glory, insult to the memory of the defenders of the Fatherland or public humiliation of the honor and dignity of veterans of the Great Patriotic War.”
Sigida serves as a clergyman in the Independent Orthodox Church, led by Archbishop Viktor Pivovarov, 88. Pivovarov, who is facing both administrative and criminal prosecution, previously labeled Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as “diabolical”. The church does not maintain communion with the Moscow Patriarchate.
On December 8, the Slavyansk City Court registered four administrative cases against Sigida based on part of Article 20 of the Administrative Code of Russian law. Court records show the court assigned the cases to different judges, Forum 18 reported.
The allegations include publicly discrediting the Russian military, engaging in “petty hooliganism,” disseminating information “in vulgar form” on the Internet and telecommunications networks that “insults human dignity and public order,” and “blatant contempt for society, the state, the official state symbols of the Russian Federation, the Constitution of the Russian Federation, or entities exercising state power in the Russian Federation.”
Forum 18 said, “It is unclear what material forms the basis of the four administrative charges or why Father Iona is facing an administrative prosecution at the same time as a criminal investigation.”
“Maybe (police and investigators) want to meet their quota by the end of the year and start investigating further. Who knows,” the rights group quoted an anonymous church member living outside Russia as saying.
Investigators searched the homes of church parishioners and questioned them about posts on the church’s website. The content on the website disappeared on November 27th. Investigators seized her electronic devices but did not open any administrative or criminal proceedings against her.
“Father Iona and Archbishop Victor have published articles on the church’s website until the summer of 2024,” Forum 18 reported. “These works not only discussed theology and liturgy, but also often critically evaluated aspects of Russian history and modern society from a religious perspective.”
Rights groups sent a letter to the authorities on December 15, demanding clarification of four administrative cases and asking whether any criminal cases remain unresolved. Forum 18 addressed these questions to the Krasnodar Region Investigative Committee, the Krasnodar Region Branch of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and the Slavyansk Police. There was no response from officials by Friday (Dec. 19).
Mr. Sigida will face a further court hearing on Tuesday (December 23) before Judges Natalya Kovalchuk and Viktoriya Statova. He is scheduled to appear at a final hearing before Judge Nikolai Mironenko on January 14.
Mr. Sigida and Mr. Pivovarov both experienced a prior attack on the church grounds at 6 a.m. on October 3, 2023. They awoke to find military personnel with machine guns raiding the scene and seizing electronic equipment, documents and computer hard drives.
“They suddenly took me inside, threw me to the ground, made me stumble and lie face down on the floor,” Sigida told the Novaya Gazeta media outlet at the time. He described how men in camouflage uniforms burst into the temple with machine guns and pinned him to the floor.
“They rushed into the temple wearing camouflage uniforms, SOBR balaclavas, and carrying machine guns like soldiers. They twisted me to the floor. Then (one of them) put his knee on my back and squeezed me, so I suffocated,” Sigida said.
Russian security forces reportedly interrogated Sigida and punched him in the body and face. He told Novaya Gazeta that they twisted his arm behind his back. They tried to shave him, but they stopped when the priest, who suffers from a spinal disease, started convulsing. He said that at the police station, officers forced an 18-year-old “witness” to say that he had resisted the officers by lunging at them and grabbing them.
Sigida spent two days in jail on charges of disobeying police officers. Authorities also filed a lawsuit against the father for “bringing discredit” to the military.
Pivovarov, who was fined 150,000 rubles ($1,893) by a court on April 8, 2024 for “repeatedly” discrediting the Russian military, was spared assault during a 2023 raid. However, he told Forum 18 that security forces stripped him of his clothes and threatened him.
The Slavyansk City Court previously fined Pivovarov 40,000 rubles ($505) on March 24, 2023, for “discrediting” the Russian military with his sermons. He pleaded guilty to these charges.
“I told investigators, police officers and courts: ‘If foreign tanks are under our windows, it means we are at war with the enemy, the interventionists,'” the archbishop told Novaya Gazeta Europe.
He argued that if Russian tanks invaded a neighboring country and its soldiers tortured people, it would amount to a war of aggression.
“But if our tanks are in neighboring countries, and our soldiers brutally torture our people and wage wars of aggression, then they should be cursed. Such wars are cursed by God and man. Our wars are a great evil,” the archbishop said.
The archbishop also told Novaya Gazeta Europe in 2023 that he expected jail or the death penalty.
“I’m waiting to be killed or imprisoned,” Pivovarov said. “Then the world will know and wonder: Who was he? Did he know in advance what was going to happen and the mysteries of existence? Where were we looking? And then there will definitely be a coup and an uprising in Russia.”
