In the Pskov region, the parish of the Russian Orthodox Church evicted several tenants from a house

In January 2018, it became known that the parish of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Pskov region evicted pensioners from a rural house.

We are talking about a house in the village of Zhabory, Porkhovsky district, in which several elderly women, parishioners of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad, lived since 1998. The Russian Orthodox Church began to lay claim to this temple in 2010, seeking that the house be transferred to the ownership of the Intercession Church, located in the same village. Unofficially, this parish is led by nun Mikhaila (Butakova), the former abbess of the Intercession Monastery in Kazakhstan, who was defrocked for robbing the monastery and selling the monastery. The ROC tried to prove that the house occupied by the ROCOR community was a converted stable, transferred to the ROC by a local collective farm in 1991.

The Pskov Arbitration Court then satisfied the demands of the Russian Orthodox Church, but the community challenged this decision. The Vologda Arbitration Court annulled the decision to transfer the house to the Russian Orthodox Church, but did not transfer it to the people living in it, recognizing the building as controversial and ownerless.

In 2014, the parish of the Russian Orthodox Church finally registered ownership of the house, despite the court decision, but failed to evict the women living in it.

In 2017, the Pokrovsky parish again went to court, this time with a demand to evict the residents from the house. On December 27, the court granted the claim, ordering the eviction of two of the six women living (the parish apparently did not know about the rest) and transferring ownership of the house to an individual - nun Mikhail. On December 31, parish representatives changed the locks on the house and threw the belongings of the residents into the street.

On May 8, 2018, it became known that the prosecutor’s office confirmed the legality of the eviction of pensioners. In response to a deputy request from the chairman of the Pskov regional branch and member of the federal political committee of the Yabloko party, Lev Shlosberg, it is reported that the house is legally registered in the name of S. L. Fokina (secretary of nun Mikhaila). The prosecutor's office explained the change of locks and the throwing away of the pensioners' property by the fact that "the owner of the property took measures to dispose of the living quarters." At the same time, the response from the prosecutor’s office notes that there is no judicial act on eviction.

Sources

• Popova L. Blessing for the takeover: in the Pskov region, the Russian Orthodox Church evicts a war veteran from his house // MBKh-media. 2018. January 12.
• The prosecutor's office recognized the eviction of the ROC MP parish from the house of retired parishioners of the ROCOR in the Pskov region as legal // Portal-Credo.ru. 2018. May 10. (with reference to MBKH Media)