Donetsk, Jun 24 — DAN. The legal team of a British mercenary Shaun Pinner sentenced to death by the DPR Supreme Court is preparing to appeal the verdict.
“I prepare an appeal in the interests and on behalf of my client, I will meet him to discuss if he wants to add something,” said Yulia Tserkovnikova, the defence lawyer.
Earlier Russian Interfax news agency reported that another British mercenary sentenced to death, Aiden Aslin, is going to appeal on his own, and the third defendant, Moroccan national Saadun Brahim, will file his appeal next week.
Tserkovnikova clarified that the court’s decision comes into force after the appeals are heard. Afterwards, if the appeals are denied, the sentenced can ask apply for a pardon.
The Appeals Chamber of the Donetsk People’s Republic Supreme Court handed down on June 9 death sentences to three foreign mercenaries who had fought on the side of Ukrainian armed formations. The defendants, British nationals Shaun Pinner and Aiden Aslin and a Moroccan national Saadun Brahim, are the first foreign mercenaries to be convicted in the Donetsk People’s Republic. They were accused under four articles of the DPR Criminal Code: committing a crime by a group of persons, violent coup or retention of power by force, mercenarism and training for terrorist activity. The mercenaries pleaded guilty to the charges.
The court found that the mercenaries’ actions led to civilian casualties and damage to the Republic’s social and civil infrastructure. *ot