The criminal case of Mr. Khodorkovsky, Mr. Lebedev and Mr. Krainov was considered during ten months. Three professional judges are announcing the sentence in turn.
During the whole past week the court pronounced the verdict during half a day. The lawyers do not hope for completion of the announcement of the sentence shortly, and presume that it will take a long time. One of Mr. Khodorkovsky's lawyers, Yuri Shmidt, told journalists that they should "get ready to work near the Meshchansky court till the end of this month."
During five days of the session the judges pronounced only the setting-forth part of the verdict, and started announcing its motivation part. Ten out of the 11 episodes incriminated to Mr. Khodorkovsky and Mr. Lebedev were announced in the setting-forth part, except the charge on the episode relating to the misappropriation by fraud of 20% of the Apatit shares. The state prosecutors earlier asked to find the defendants guilty of the misappropriation of the Apatit shares but to free them from punishment because of the expiry of the limitation period.
The court ruled that Mr. Khodorkovsky as a member of an organized group misappropriated money received from the sale of apatite concentrate , and evaded, together with Mr. Lebedev, paying taxes as a physical person and a legal entity.
The part of the sentence, linked with the misappropriation of 44% of the shares of the scientific research institute of fertilizers and insecticides-fungicides was also read out. The court found Mr. Khodorkovsky and Mr. Lebedev guilty of this episode. But the defendants' actions were re-qualified from Article 159 into Article 147 of the Russian Federation's Criminal Code which carries a less severe punishment.
The lawyers do not doubt any longer that the court will deliver a verdict of guilty, and, as they say, the moot question is the term of the punishment.
Mr. Khodorkovsky has been kept in the investigatory isolation ward for nearly eighteen months, and Mr. Lebedev - for twenty months. They are charged under seven articles of the Criminal Code each, including tax evasion and large-scale fraud.
Mr. Krainov is charged with the fraudulently doing damage to owners' property and with the non-execution of a court decision which has come into legal force.
Mr. Khodorkovsky and Mr. Lebedev did not plead guilty in the course of the hearings, while Mr. Krainov pleaded guilty in part. The prosecutors asked the court to find Mr. Khodorkovsky and Mr. Lebedev guilty on all the seven counts, and to sentence each of them to ten years of deprivation of liberty with serving the sentence in a colony with a general regime. The prosecutors also asked to sentence Mr. Krainov to 5.5 years of deprivation of liberty (a suspended sentence).
A few days before the beginning of the announcement of the sentence chief of the information and public relations directorate of the Prosecutor-General's Office Natalia Vishnyakova stated that new charges would be brought against Mr. Khodorkovsky and Mr. Lebedev in the immediate future. "They will be related to the legalization of ill-gotten money amounting to billions of roubles," she said.
