22 November 2001
Priest murder retrial ends in acquittal
The Brest Regional Court has acquitted Gennady Kolesnikov, a former Orthodox deacon in Brest in southwestern Belarus, of the 1998 murder of local priest Mikhail Satsyuk.
Mr. Satsyuk was found stabbed in the back seat of his car in a forest in Brest in October 1998. He was buried with exceptional honors in the yard of his church. The service was conducted by Exarch Filaret, head of the Russian Orthodox Church in Belarus.
Mr. Kolesnikov came under suspicion very soon but was not arrested until December 1999. He confessed to killing the priest over sexual harassment on the victim's part and stood a closed-doors trial. The Brest Regional Court sentenced him to 20 years in jail in July 2000.
The Supreme Court of Belarus vacated the sentence for "lack of evidence," remanding the case for retrial. The Regional Court came up with the same verdict on November 21. Mr. Kolesnikov was released right in the courtroom. The case against the ex-deacon was airtight; his acquittal is absurd and must have been ordered by Minsk, BelaPAN was
told by an officer of the Brest Prosecutor's Office who spoke on condition of anonymity. The Church is trying to hush up any evidence of homosexuality within its ranks, the officer said.
http://brestonline.com/en/news/news107.html