The prosecutor asked for seven years in a maximum security colony for Jehovah's Witnesses from Crimea

During the debate in the Dzhankoy District Court, the prosecutor requested 7 years of imprisonment in a maximum security colony for local resident Sergei Filatov, who organized meetings of Jehovah's Witnesses. This was reported by the online publication “Grati” with reference to Filatov himself.

Filatov, who is under recognizance not to leave the place, is accused of organizing the activities of an extremist organization (Part 1 of Article 282.2 of the Criminal Code). According to investigators, Filatov, being the head of a religious organization, “undermined the foundations of the constitutional order and the security of the state.” The case file includes an audio recording organized by local FSB operative Vladislav Stradetsky, in which Filatov and other believers discuss religious topics.

The prosecution believes that Filatov is one of the founders of the Jehovah's Witnesses organization called "Sivash", which held meetings and religious performances at the place of registration of the accused.

In previous hearings in the Filatov case, a computer science teacher in a rural school named Verbitsky participated as the only witness. It is reported that in September 2019, he told how he came to meetings of Jehovah’s Witnesses until the organization was banned in April 2017, so he does not know about Filatov’s further actions. However, in November he changed his testimony and said that he went to meetings of believers for about six months.

At the request of Verbitsky, who stated that there was pressure from the accused, the judge made the hearings closed. The Jehovah's Witnesses website reports that the pressure came from calls from strangers. The defense asked several times to make the trial open, but this never happened.

Sergei Filatov has four children, two of them are minors. He considers the process biased, and the whole case repressive on religious grounds. “The prosecutor asked for 7 years for extremist activities. For religious doctrine, for the fact that a person believes in God - 7 years. There is no crime, no guilt. The 51st year, the 37th year, which were in Russia and here, are returning, among us today there are people who were persecuted, were sent into exile. This is arbitrariness and genocide,” Grati quoted the believer as saying after the trial.

• In November 2018, massive searches took place in the homes of local Jehovah's Witnesses in Dzhankoy. Investigative actions took place at several dozen addresses. Only Sergei Filatov was detained; extremist literature and reference books on psychology and recruitment were allegedly found in his possession.
• On April 20, 2017, the Supreme Court recognized the “Administrative Center of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Russia” as an extremist organization, liquidated it and banned its activities in Russia. In August, all Jehovah's Witnesses organizations were added to the list of prohibited organizations. After this, a stream of criminal cases against representatives of the confession began.