200 days: Orda speaks with Yemil Trapeznikov, Previously Convicted of Self-defense

On November 6 this year, Kazakhstan's Supreme Court acquitted Yemil Trapeznikov. That same evening, he was already with his family. An Orda.kz correspondent met with the teenager and his lawyers.

Yemil's closest relatives and lawyers gathered at a small table. Yemil looked calm and, oddly enough, cheerful.

However, his eyes revealed a dramatic change: he took everything around him seriously and thoughtfully.

For me, these six-plus months spent in prison have become a good lesson. Now I understand that before waving your hands or making any decisions, you need to think carefully, Yemil says, smiling slightly. 

He said the institutions where he was – two pretrial detention centers and a juvenile colony – did not have the worst conditions.

Where he was supposed to spend a year and six months, they woke up, had lessons, like at school, breakfast, lunch, dinner, and lights out. In their free time, they could watch TV or play Playstation. 

Nothing beats freedom, though. 

This is not an event that he can easily forget. Yemil will remember this for the rest of his life. Now we want to convince him to go to a psychologist, because the young man still has some concerns,  lawyer Rena Kerimova said.

The human rights activists say the state must fully compensate for Trapeznikov's emotional distress.

After receiving the Supreme Court ruling, the lawyers intend to file a lawsuit for compensation for moral damage and material costs. The amount is currently being negotiated with relatives, within 10-15 million tenge. 

Nobody believed that I would be acquitted. Everyone - both the staff of the institution and the convicted persons sitting with me - said that no matter how unfair the sentence was, it would never be overturned,Trapeznikov says.

 They were all indeed taken aback.

We had doubts about a favorable decision on our cassation. But when I saw the presiding judge, and it was Nazgul Rakhmetullina, I became confident that they would make a fair decision and fully acquit our client. And so it happened. The hearing began at 15:00, the verdict was announced at 16:30, and literally at 16:35 here in Almaty, Yemil was told that he was free, says Rena Kerimova.

The family hoped for a commuted sentence, but no one knew he would be home on the evening of the same day the trial took place. 

The lawyers did a colossal, careful, painstaking job. They were not satisfied with little. That is, in the spring they could have applied for parole. But this magnificent trio of lawyers - Rena Kerimova, Elena Zhigalenok, Azamat Baikenov - did everything to ensure that justice prevailed,activist Zhanna says.

When asked whether human rights activists would request that the judge who made the initial ruling and the appeals panel members be held accountable, they responded that they would discuss it:

I think that the judge of the first instance should simply be dismissed. She works with teenagers, the fate of children is in her hands. Here you need to be an impartial, competent specialist, says lawyer Azamat Baikenov. 

Yemil hopes he will be allowed to catch up on the ninth-grade curriculum and reinstate it in the tenth grade to continue studying with his peers. After finishing school, he plans to serve in the army and pursue further education. He hasn’t decided what to study but has plenty of time.

The incident involving Yemil occurred in Qonayev at the end of April last year. Three intoxicated men started a fight with two teenagers. One died after the fight. The court of first instance sentenced Yemil Trapeznikov to six years and eight months of imprisonment under the article "Intentional Infliction of Grievous Bodily Harm Resulting in Death." 

The appellate court reclassified the article to "Causing Death by Negligence (Manslaughter)" and reduced the sentence to one and a half years. The teenager's defense later appealed to the Supreme Court.

Original Author: Kumysay Sarbasova