Defence of suspects of attempt on President of Chechnya to appeal against the verdict

Advocates of Lors Khamiev and Umar Batukaev, accused of an attempt on President of Chechnya Ramzan Kadyrov, who were sentenced today to eight and five years of high security colony, find the verdict unfair and plan to appeal against it. The "Caucasian Knot" correspondent was told about it by Marud Musaev, Batukaev's advocate.

"In winter of 2007, my client helped his friend to push a car, in which later firearms were found, but he didn't know about it," Mr Musaev said to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent. "However, he was accused of storing firearms." He promised to appeal against the verdict.

Student Lors Khamiev was today sentenced by the Moscow City Court to eight years of high security colony for preparing an attempt on one's life. Umar Batukaev got five years of colony for storing firearms and using faked documents. One more figurant of the case, Ruslan Musaev, was completely acquitted by the court.

"I radically disagree with the qualification of the crime in the verdict and punishment terms," Oleg Pankratov, another Batukaev's advocate, said to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent. "Batukaev has nothing to do with the attempt on Kadyrov. On the contrary, he approved Chechen President's policy; he never knew and still doesn't know the people who had planned it."

According to advocates, Lors Khamiev should have escaped any punishment at all. "He prevented the attempt himself by informing law enforcement bodies," said Murad Musaev. "The jurymen found this fact as proved. Thus, under the law, Khamiev should have been left unpunished."

At the same time, advocates of Ruslan Musaev, who had admitted only one point of his indictment - faking his higher education diploma - plan to apply for compensation for all the years he had spent behind bars. "His innocence was clear to us from the very beginning, but we couldn't convince inspectors," Shamil Arifulov, Musaev's advocate, said to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent. "All the time, we insisted on changing his freedom restriction mode, however, he had to spend almost 2 years in custody! His health was undermined, and his small son was reared all this time without father. We want to stand for compensation."