Having examined the cassation complaints of the defendant and his defence counsel, on August 3, the Department of Criminal Cases of the Senate (Supreme Court), decided not to initiate cassation proceedings in the criminal case on the charge of espionage on behalf of the Belarusian military intelligence service. The Senate found that, contrary to what was stated in the cassation complaints, the courts of the lower instances have carefully assessed the nature of the committed crime, the damage caused, the personality of the perpetrator, as well as mitigating and aggravating circumstances, and have imposed a legal, justified and fair penalty for the crime committed. At the same time as the decision of the Senate takes effect, the decision of the Riga Regional Court of April 20, 2023 comes into force, leaving the judgement of the Riga City Court unchanged and finding the defendant guilty of espionage, that is, of illegally collecting information on behalf of a foreign intelligence service. The defendant is sentenced to 8-year imprisonment and 3-year probation supervision.

The Senate established that both the Riga City Court and the Riga Regional Court reasonably concluded that the defendant had committed a particularly serious crime with a high degree of harm. The court recognized that the defendant had been systematically spying for several years. The court stated that in the conditions of the geopolitical situation, where the relevant intelligence service country has turned from a constructive partner into a source of threats and instability in the region, the collection of information by photographing and making video recordings of critical infrastructure objects of Latvia and NATO, which relate to the state's activities in the fields of defence, energy, traffic, and the transfer of the said information to the intelligence service of the aggressor country create the possibility of using this information for activities that are contrary to the security, economic and political interests of the Republic of Latvia.

In its decision, the Senate recognized the conclusion of the lower courts as well-founded, namely that the harmfulness of the collection and transfer of information to a foreign intelligence service is determined not so much by the nature of the information transferred, as by the fact of cooperation with a foreign intelligence service. Therefore, in order to prosecute a person for this type of crime, the occurrence of harmful effects is not required.

The case has the status of a closed case.

 

Information prepared by Baiba Kataja, the Press Secretary of the Supreme Court

Tel.: +371 67020396; e-mail: baiba.kataja@at.gov.lv