Russian court sentences 14 neo-Nazis to jail for hate killings, assaults
By APTuesday, July 27, 2010
Russian court sentences 14 neo-Nazis to jail
MOSCOW — A court in central Russia has sentenced a neo-Nazi leader to life in jail and imprisoned 13 others for four hate killings and multiple assaults.
The Tver city court said in a statement Tuesday that 22-year-old Dmitry Orlov led a cell of the Russian National Unity, a once-powerful organization that since 1990 has actively advocated white supremacy and Orthodox Christian fundamentalism.
It says the other defendants, including three teenagers, received sentences of between 3 1/2 and 17 years.
In addition to the attacks, the court says, the defendants also owned arms and extremist literature and desecrated Muslim and Jewish cemeteries.
The Kremlin has recently cracked down on ultranationalists amid a spike in ethnic violence and killings of non-Slavs: mostly labor migrants from Central Asia and the Caucasus.
