'Jesus of Siberia' sect leader jailed for 12 years
Sergei Torop, a former traffic policeman known to his followers as "Vissarion," set up the Church of the Last Testament in a remote but picturesque part of Siberia's Krasnoyarsk region in 1991, the year the Soviet Union broke up.
A bearded self-styled mystic with long hair, he claimed to have been "reborn" to convey the word of God and attracted thousands of followers, some of whom flocked to live in a settlement known as the "Abode of Dawn" or "Sun City," at a time when Russia was battling poverty and lawlessness.
Torop, 64, told his followers, who regularly intoned prayers in his honour as they looked up to his large hilltop residence, not to eat meat, not to smoke, not to drink alcohol or swear and to stop using money.
But the Investigative Committee, Russia's equivalent of the US FBI, accused Torop and two aides of using psychological pressure to extract money from his followers and of causing serious harm to their mental and physical health.
In a statement on Monday, a court in the Siberian city of Novosibirsk said it had convicted the three men, sentencing Torop and Vladimir Vedernikov to 12 years and Vadim Redkin to 11 years in a maximum-security prison camp.
They were also ordered to pay 40 million roubles ($A782,000) to compensate their victims for "moral damage".
All three denied wrongdoing.
Torop and the two aides were arrested in a security forces raid by helicopter in 2020 that involved the FSB security service, the successor agency to the Soviet KGB.
According to the RIA state news agency, investigators said the men had caused "moral harm" to 16 people, serious damage to the physical health of six people and moderate damage to another person's health.
Vedernikov, one of the aides, had also been accused of committing fraud, RIA said.
In a 2017 BBC documentary, filmmaker Simon Reeve interviewed Torop, who denied any wrongdoing.
The film showed how school girls whose parents were his followers were being educated to be what a local teacher called "future brides for worthy men".
A Russian sect leader who claimed he was Jesus Christ reincarnated has been sentenced to 12 years in a prison camp after being convicted of harming his followers' health and financial affairs.
Sergei Torop, a former traffic policeman known to his followers as "Vissarion," set up the Church of the Last Testament in a remote but picturesque part of Siberia's Krasnoyarsk region in 1991, the year the Soviet Union broke up.
A bearded self-styled mystic with long hair, he claimed to have been "reborn" to convey the word of God and attracted thousands of followers, some of whom flocked to live in a settlement known as the "Abode of Dawn" or "Sun City," at a time when Russia was battling poverty and lawlessness.
Torop, 64, told his followers, who regularly intoned prayers in his honour as they looked up to his large hilltop residence, not to eat meat, not to smoke, not to drink alcohol or swear and to stop using money.
But the Investigative Committee, Russia's equivalent of the US FBI, accused Torop and two aides of using psychological pressure to extract money from his followers and of causing serious harm to their mental and physical health.
In a statement on Monday, a court in the Siberian city of Novosibirsk said it had convicted the three men, sentencing Torop and Vladimir Vedernikov to 12 years and Vadim Redkin to 11 years in a maximum-security prison camp.
They were also ordered to pay 40 million roubles ($A782,000) to compensate their victims for "moral damage".
All three denied wrongdoing.
Torop and the two aides were arrested in a security forces raid by helicopter in 2020 that involved the FSB security service, the successor agency to the Soviet KGB.
According to the RIA state news agency, investigators said the men had caused "moral harm" to 16 people, serious damage to the physical health of six people and moderate damage to another person's health.
Vedernikov, one of the aides, had also been accused of committing fraud, RIA said.
In a 2017 BBC documentary, filmmaker Simon Reeve interviewed Torop, who denied any wrongdoing.
The film showed how school girls whose parents were his followers were being educated to be what a local teacher called "future brides for worthy men".
A Russian sect leader who claimed he was Jesus Christ reincarnated has been sentenced to 12 years in a prison camp after being convicted of harming his followers' health and financial affairs.
Sergei Torop, a former traffic policeman known to his followers as "Vissarion," set up the Church of the Last Testament in a remote but picturesque part of Siberia's Krasnoyarsk region in 1991, the year the Soviet Union broke up.
A bearded self-styled mystic with long hair, he claimed to have been "reborn" to convey the word of God and attracted thousands of followers, some of whom flocked to live in a settlement known as the "Abode of Dawn" or "Sun City," at a time when Russia was battling poverty and lawlessness.
Torop, 64, told his followers, who regularly intoned prayers in his honour as they looked up to his large hilltop residence, not to eat meat, not to smoke, not to drink alcohol or swear and to stop using money.
But the Investigative Committee, Russia's equivalent of the US FBI, accused Torop and two aides of using psychological pressure to extract money from his followers and of causing serious harm to their mental and physical health.
In a statement on Monday, a court in the Siberian city of Novosibirsk said it had convicted the three men, sentencing Torop and Vladimir Vedernikov to 12 years and Vadim Redkin to 11 years in a maximum-security prison camp.
They were also ordered to pay 40 million roubles ($A782,000) to compensate their victims for "moral damage".
All three denied wrongdoing.
Torop and the two aides were arrested in a security forces raid by helicopter in 2020 that involved the FSB security service, the successor agency to the Soviet KGB.
According to the RIA state news agency, investigators said the men had caused "moral harm" to 16 people, serious damage to the physical health of six people and moderate damage to another person's health.
Vedernikov, one of the aides, had also been accused of committing fraud, RIA said.
In a 2017 BBC documentary, filmmaker Simon Reeve interviewed Torop, who denied any wrongdoing.
The film showed how school girls whose parents were his followers were being educated to be what a local teacher called "future brides for worthy men".
A Russian sect leader who claimed he was Jesus Christ reincarnated has been sentenced to 12 years in a prison camp after being convicted of harming his followers' health and financial affairs.
Sergei Torop, a former traffic policeman known to his followers as "Vissarion," set up the Church of the Last Testament in a remote but picturesque part of Siberia's Krasnoyarsk region in 1991, the year the Soviet Union broke up.
A bearded self-styled mystic with long hair, he claimed to have been "reborn" to convey the word of God and attracted thousands of followers, some of whom flocked to live in a settlement known as the "Abode of Dawn" or "Sun City," at a time when Russia was battling poverty and lawlessness.
Torop, 64, told his followers, who regularly intoned prayers in his honour as they looked up to his large hilltop residence, not to eat meat, not to smoke, not to drink alcohol or swear and to stop using money.
But the Investigative Committee, Russia's equivalent of the US FBI, accused Torop and two aides of using psychological pressure to extract money from his followers and of causing serious harm to their mental and physical health.
In a statement on Monday, a court in the Siberian city of Novosibirsk said it had convicted the three men, sentencing Torop and Vladimir Vedernikov to 12 years and Vadim Redkin to 11 years in a maximum-security prison camp.
They were also ordered to pay 40 million roubles ($A782,000) to compensate their victims for "moral damage".
All three denied wrongdoing.
Torop and the two aides were arrested in a security forces raid by helicopter in 2020 that involved the FSB security service, the successor agency to the Soviet KGB.
According to the RIA state news agency, investigators said the men had caused "moral harm" to 16 people, serious damage to the physical health of six people and moderate damage to another person's health.
Vedernikov, one of the aides, had also been accused of committing fraud, RIA said.
In a 2017 BBC documentary, filmmaker Simon Reeve interviewed Torop, who denied any wrongdoing.
The film showed how school girls whose parents were his followers were being educated to be what a local teacher called "future brides for worthy men".
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The soldier came to law enforcement attention as part of an operation that was established after a March 2019 terrorist attack on two mosques in the city of Christchurch, when an Australian white supremacist opened fire on Muslim worshippers, killing 51. He was based at Linton Military Camp near the city of Palmerston North. Officers spoke to the man twice about his involvement in a group, court documents showed, and after the government became aware he had expressed a desire to defect he was contacted by the undercover officer. When the soldier's hard drive was searched, investigators found a copy of Christchurch gunman Brenton Tarrant's live-streamed video of his massacre and a manifesto document he published online before the killings. Possession of either without permission is a criminal offence in New Zealand and the soldier, who admitted that charge too, joins several others convicted in New Zealand of having or sharing the terrorist's banned material. 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A New Zealand soldier who tried to spy for a foreign power has admitted to attempted espionage in a military court. Monday's conviction was the first for spying in New Zealand's history. The soldier's name was suppressed, as was what country to which he sought to pass secrets. Military court documents said the man believed he was engaged with a foreign agent in 2019 when he tried to communicate military information including base telephone directories and maps, assessments of security weaknesses, his own identity card and log-in details for a military network. The wording of the charge said his actions were "likely to prejudice the security or defence of New Zealand". He was not speaking to a foreign agent, but an undercover New Zealand police officer collecting intelligence on alleged right-wing extremist groups, documents supplied by the military court showed. The soldier came to law enforcement attention as part of an operation that was established after a March 2019 terrorist attack on two mosques in the city of Christchurch, when an Australian white supremacist opened fire on Muslim worshippers, killing 51. He was based at Linton Military Camp near the city of Palmerston North. Officers spoke to the man twice about his involvement in a group, court documents showed, and after the government became aware he had expressed a desire to defect he was contacted by the undercover officer. When the soldier's hard drive was searched, investigators found a copy of Christchurch gunman Brenton Tarrant's live-streamed video of his massacre and a manifesto document he published online before the killings. Possession of either without permission is a criminal offence in New Zealand and the soldier, who admitted that charge too, joins several others convicted in New Zealand of having or sharing the terrorist's banned material. In a statement read to the court by his lawyer, the man said the two nationalist groups with which the man was involved were "no more than groups of friends with similar points of view to my own", according to Radio New Zealand. The lawyer, Steve Winter, added that his client denied supporting the Christchurch shooter's ideology, RNZ reported. The soldier also pleaded guilty to accessing a military computer system for dishonest purposes. Each of the three charges carries a maximum prison term of either seven or 10 years in New Zealand. His sentence is expected to be delivered by a military panel within days of his conviction. His was the first charge in a New Zealand military court for espionage or attempted spying. The last time such a case reached the civilian courts before was in 1975, when a public servant was acquitted on charges alleging he had passed information to Russian agents. A New Zealand soldier who tried to spy for a foreign power has admitted to attempted espionage in a military court. Monday's conviction was the first for spying in New Zealand's history. The soldier's name was suppressed, as was what country to which he sought to pass secrets. Military court documents said the man believed he was engaged with a foreign agent in 2019 when he tried to communicate military information including base telephone directories and maps, assessments of security weaknesses, his own identity card and log-in details for a military network. The wording of the charge said his actions were "likely to prejudice the security or defence of New Zealand". He was not speaking to a foreign agent, but an undercover New Zealand police officer collecting intelligence on alleged right-wing extremist groups, documents supplied by the military court showed. The soldier came to law enforcement attention as part of an operation that was established after a March 2019 terrorist attack on two mosques in the city of Christchurch, when an Australian white supremacist opened fire on Muslim worshippers, killing 51. He was based at Linton Military Camp near the city of Palmerston North. Officers spoke to the man twice about his involvement in a group, court documents showed, and after the government became aware he had expressed a desire to defect he was contacted by the undercover officer. When the soldier's hard drive was searched, investigators found a copy of Christchurch gunman Brenton Tarrant's live-streamed video of his massacre and a manifesto document he published online before the killings. Possession of either without permission is a criminal offence in New Zealand and the soldier, who admitted that charge too, joins several others convicted in New Zealand of having or sharing the terrorist's banned material. In a statement read to the court by his lawyer, the man said the two nationalist groups with which the man was involved were "no more than groups of friends with similar points of view to my own", according to Radio New Zealand. The lawyer, Steve Winter, added that his client denied supporting the Christchurch shooter's ideology, RNZ reported. The soldier also pleaded guilty to accessing a military computer system for dishonest purposes. Each of the three charges carries a maximum prison term of either seven or 10 years in New Zealand. His sentence is expected to be delivered by a military panel within days of his conviction. His was the first charge in a New Zealand military court for espionage or attempted spying. The last time such a case reached the civilian courts before was in 1975, when a public servant was acquitted on charges alleging he had passed information to Russian agents.
