The Dnipro Court of Appeal left unchanged the decision of the court of first instance on the life imprisonment of the ex-leader of the “LNR”Igor Plotnitsky and two other militants of terrorist groups in the case of the destruction of the IL-76 aircraft at the Lugansk airport.
Thus, in addition to Plotnitsky, the deputy commander of the illegal armed formation “Zarya Battalion” was convictedAndrey Patrushev and the commander of an illegal armed formation “Vityaz”Alexey Gureev. They were convicted under Part 3 of Article 258 (commission of a terrorist act) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.
The verdict has entered into force. At the moment, the Security Service of Ukraine is trying to detain the accused and stage them to serve their sentences.
The case of the downing of the IL-17
On June 14, 2014, terrorists shot down a Ukrainian military transport plane IL-76 while landing at Lugansk airport. There were nine crew members and 40 paratroopers of the 25th separate Dnepropetrovsk Airborne Brigade on board the aircraft. They all died.
Only in March 2020, the Krasnogvardeysky District Court of Dnipro sentenced these terrorists to life imprisonment for shooting down an IL-76 aircraft. Then the trial was held in absentia, and the case itself lasted more than three years. In addition to life imprisonment, the militants were ordered to pay compensation to each family of the victims for 500 thousand hryvnias of moral damage.
After that, the lawyer of the families of the victims, Vitaly Poghosyan, filed an appeal against the court’s decision. In the appeal, he tried to appeal the part of the decision that says about moral damage to the relatives of the 49 victims. Poghosyan insisted that the compensation should be paid by the state, not the militants.
