'Siberian Jesus' sentenced to Russian prison after harming followers in bizarre cult
Sergei Torop, a former traffic policeman known to his followers as "Vissarion," meaning "he who gives new life," and two aides used psychological pressure to extract money from his followers and cause serious harm to their mental and physical health, Reuters reported.
Torop, 64, set up the Church of the Last Testament in a remote part of Siberia's Krasnoyarsk region in 1991, the year the Soviet Union broke up.
He was one of three men convicted Monday in the Siberian city of Novosibirsk. Torop and Vladimir Vedernikov were sentenced to 12 years, and Vadim Redkin was sentenced to 11 years in a maximum-security prison camp.
All three men were arrested in 2020 in a helicopter raid that involved the FSB security service, the successor agency to the Soviet KGB.
A bearded self-styled mystic with long hair, Torop claimed to have been "reborn" to convey the word of God. He 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, according to Reuters.
He told his followers not to eat meat, smoke, drink alcohol or swear and to stop using money.
Investigators said the men brought "moral harm" to 16 people, damage to the physical health of six people and moderate damage to another person's health.
Vedernikov had also been accused of committing fraud, the RIA state news agency reported.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Washington Post
an hour ago
- Washington Post
Russia restricts WhatsApp and Telegram calls in push to control internet
Russia has started restricting some calls on WhatsApp and Telegram, clamping down on the popular foreign-owned encrypted messaging platforms as it pushes for more control over internet use. The country's digital watchdog claimed that the encrypted messaging apps are being used for 'sabotage and terrorist activities,' accusing the foreign-owned tech firms of ignoring demands to share information with law enforcement authorities, according to a statement provided to the Russian news agency Interfax.
Yahoo
3 hours ago
- Yahoo
Despite risks, residents fight to protect Russian national park
After getting fined for her environmental protest against a road being built through a national park near Moscow, Irina Kuriseva is back to check on the construction. "We only want to defend nature," the 62-year-old told AFP at the Losiny Ostrov (Elk Island) park, a 129-square-kilometre nature reserve with hundreds of species of wildlife including endangered birds. With dissident voices in Russia almost totally silenced and as the country presses on with its massive military offensive in Ukraine, environmental activism has become highly risky. "The authorities have become completely indifferent" and laws have been "softened" in favour of polluters and property developers, said one activist, speaking on condition of anonymity. In the outskirts of Moscow, the issue has become particularly acute as developers continue to build new homes and residents commuting to the capital find themselves stuck in traffic jams for hours. In Korolyov, a town of 200,000 people, the authorities decided to build a highway that passes through the national park to ease congestion and give access to a new housing development. In July, Kuriseva and five other activists blocked machinery spreading asphalt in the forest. They were arrested by police and fined, after spending a night at the police station. "We were interrogated like criminals who had killed someone," said Kuriseva, a local resident. Russian law prohibits construction in national parks but local authorities got around it by arguing that the project consisted of "repairs" to an existing road. Dmitry Trunin, an environmental defence lawyer with more than 25 years of experience, said this argument amounted to "falsification and fraud". "There was never a road there," he said, explaining that there had only been an unpaved track used by forest rangers which then became just a path through the forest. Kuriseva said that "asphalt powder" was placed on the path in an attempt to classify it as a road. The highway is due to be completed by March 2026 at a cost of 5.4 million euros ($6.3 million), according to the regional transport ministry. - 'Don't get the president involved' - Mikhail Rogov, a 36-year-old engineer who also took part in the protest with Kuriseva, said the judge was "smiling" to the defendants in court. "She told us: 'If you don't want any problems, sign these papers, pay your fines and you're free'," he said. The judge, Maria Loktionova, had in 2023 sentenced another environmental activist, Alexander Bakhtin, to six years in prison for three posts on social media criticising the Russian offensive in Ukraine. Despite the crackdown on dissent, activists opposed to the highway have sought to appeal to President Vladimir Putin to help their cause. In June, around a thousand people queued outside the presidential administration building in Moscow to submit their complaints. Putin visited the national park in 2010 and fed a baby elk with a bottle, telling reporters that nature was "a gift from God" that must be "protected". The tone from the Kremlin is very different in 2025. "This is a question for the regional authorities. Don't get the president involved," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in July when asked about the project by AFP. Environmental protection "should not be a barrier to development and the comfort of the lives of citizens," he said. Trunin said it has become "harder and harder to defend the truth in court". "The power vertical takes decisions and law enforcement and monitoring bodies obey," he said. bur/giv
Yahoo
6 hours ago
- Yahoo
As Trump-Putin summit nears, family of Texan held in Russia seeks prisoner exchange
As President Donald Trump prepares to travel to Alaska on Friday to address the future of Ukraine with Russian President Vladimir Putin, the family of the Texas man serving the longest prison sentence of any American currently being detained in Russia is hopeful that another prisoner exchange between the two nations will be on the agenda. "We hope for better relations between the U.S. and Russia that will hopefully lead to the release of my brother," Margaret Aaron, one of David Barnes' two sisters, told ABC News anchor Gio Benitez in an interview Wednesday. Barnes, who grew up in Alabama, has been detained in Moscow since January 2022 and is currently serving a 21.5-year sentence. MORE: Moscow court rejects American David Barnes' appeal to get out of Russian prison "He's hanging in there," Aaron said. "He has been extremely strong through the last three and a half years. We're extremely proud of him and he has continued to be hopeful that something will happen." Unlike other Americans who have been held in Russia, Barnes is accused by Russian prosecutors of crimes in the United States, not Russia. Yet American law enforcement had no involvement in Barnes' prosecution in Moscow. Barnes was convicted by a Russian judge of abusing his two sons years earlier in Texas, but prosecutors in Montgomery County, Texas, told ABC News that law enforcement in the Lone Star State investigated the claims after they were reported by Barnes' Russian ex-wife and did not find evidence to support them. "I do know that everyone that heard and investigated the child sexual abuse allegations raised by Mrs. Barnes during the child custody proceedings did not find them to be credible," Montgomery County District Attorney's Office Trial Bureau Chief Kelly Blackburn previously told ABC News. "He's been suffering," Aaron said Wednesday. "He's innocent." Barnes' ex-wife, Svetlana Koptyaeva, has maintained that Barnes abused their sons while the children were growing up in the Texas suburbs years ago. Koptyaeva was charged with felony interference with child custody after allegedly taking the children from Texas to Russia in 2019 while a child custody dispute between her and Barnes was playing out. In 2020, a Texas family court designated Barnes as the primary guardian of his sons, but since since Koptyaeva had taken them out of the country, Barnes' family says he decided to travel to Russia after COVID-19 restrictions were lifted to try to fight for similar custody or visitation rights in Moscow's court system. Barnes was arrested weeks after arriving in Russia and has been behind bars ever since. In April, a judge in Moscow denied Barnes' appeal of his conviction. MORE: American David Barnes enters 4th year of detention in Russia "We really, really need to have him designated as wrongfully detained," Aaron said. "Hopefully, to start that process, we need the help of Trump and Secretary [Marco] Rubio." The upcoming meeting between Trump and Putin on American soil comes four months after Russian officials released ballerina Ksenia Karelina to the U.S. through a prisoner exchange. Following Karelina's return to the U.S., she wrote a letter to Trump calling for the release of Barnes along with fellow Americans Robert Gilman and Andre Khachatoorian. Trump posted the letter on social media. "David Barnes, a Texas father of two sons, has been detained in Russia for far too long under charges already proven to be false, and it is past time for him to be released," U.S. Senator John Cornyn of Texas said in a statement at the time. "I urge President Trump and Secretary Rubio to prioritize efforts to bring David and all wrongfully-detained Americans throughout the world home." Other Americans who were previously held in Russia, like Paul Whelan, Trevor Reed and Brittney Griner, were transferred to penal colonies far from Moscow following their convictions -- but Barnes has been held in Russia's capital since he was taken into custody. "We have visited Mr. Barnes eight times since his arrest in January 2022," a U.S. State Department spokesperson told ABC News. "Our last visit to Mr. Barnes in detention was in May 2025." With all eyes on Anchorage ahead of this week's presidential summit, Barnes' family and friends in the U.S. will be paying close attention. "David's strength keeps us going," Aaron said.
