The FSB installed cameras in a bathhouse where Perm Jehovah's Witnesses gathered

In Perm, FSB operatives installed hidden cameras in the Chaika bathhouse complex, where Jehovah's Witnesses gathered. According to MBKh Media, the accused Igor Turik spoke about this at a meeting of the Industrial District Court.

Turik learned about the installation of a hidden camera from the materials of the criminal case; lawyer Joseph Charny confirmed to Mediazona that the camera was mentioned in the case.

“They would have continued to go there if it had not turned out that they were secretly recording on video in this bathhouse... You would know what kind of mental pain these women experienced when they found out that they were recorded naked on video by “professionals in their field,” he said Turik.

In the bathhouse, according to him, on July 7, 2018, new followers of Jehovah’s Witnesses were baptized, and the FSB considered this episode to be a conspiracy for a meeting of a garden cooperative, a continuation of the criminal activities of an organization recognized as extremist.

According to MBKh Media, there were 27 people at that meeting. The recording shows Turik and fellow defendant Viktor Kuchkov dressed in white T-shirts, as well as women taking a dip in the pool.

In total, there were five defendants in the criminal case initiated under parts 1 and 2 of Article 282.2 of the Criminal Code (organization and participation in the activities of an organization recognized as extremist), as well as under Part 1 of Article 282.3 of the Criminal Code (financing the activities of an organization recognized as extremist). The state prosecution demanded from four to nine years in prison for them, but judge Viktor Podyniglazov gave them all suspended sentences: seven years for Turik and two and a half years for the rest of the defendants.

Jehovah's Witnesses were recognized as an extremist organization in Russia in April 2017, and since then hundreds of believers have been subject to criminal prosecution.