A 21-year-old Russian soldier, Vadim Shishimarin, was sentenced to life in prison on Monday for killing a civilian by a Ukrainian court in the first war crimes trial arising from Russia’s invasion. Sgt. Vadim Shishimarin, a member of a Russian tank unit who was eventually captured, had pleaded guilty to killing 62-year-old Oleksandr Shelipov in the village of Chupakhivka in the northeastern Sumy region on February 28, four days after the Russian invasion.
Criminal Order Charges
Shishimarin had testified that he shot civilian Oleksandr Shelipov from an open car window on orders from two officers who had insisted that Shelipov, who was speaking on his cellphone, could pinpoint their location to Ukrainian forces.
Judge Serhiy Agafonov said Shishimarin, carrying out a “criminal order” by a soldier of higher rank, had fired several shots at the victim’s head from an automatic weapon. “Given that the crime committed is a crime against peace, security, humanity and the international legal order … the court does not see the possibility of imposing a (shorter) sentence,” he said.
Shishmarin’s lawyer, Viktor Ovsyannikov, said he was not surprised by the sentence because there had been “certain pressure from society” and said he would launch a legal appeal. Ovsyanikov had earlier argued that his client had been unprepared for the “violent military confrontation” and mass casualties that Russian troops encountered when they first invaded Ukraine.
On Thursday, Shishimarin asked the victim’s widow, who also appeared in the trial, to forgive him for what he did. “I realize that you can’t forgive me, but I’m pleading you for forgiveness,” he told her. The woman, Kateryna Shelipova, said she found her husband dead just outside their home after the couple heard gunshots and he went to investigate. “He was all to me. He was my defender,” she said.
Shelipova told the court that Shishimarin deserves a life sentence for killing her husband but added that she wouldn’t mind if he was exchanged as part of a possible prisoner swap with Russia for the surrendered Ukrainian defenders of the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol.
Shishimarin was prosecuted under a section of the Ukrainian criminal code that addresses the laws and customs of war. As the inaugural war-crimes case in Ukraine, his case was watched closely. The trial, which began only last week, has emerged as a symbolic significance for Ukraine. An international lawyer told Reuters it could be the first of many.
Russian War Crimes
Ukrainian prosecutors are investigating thousands of potential war crimes, as the world has pushed for Russia to be held accountable for its invasion. Russian forces bombed a theater where civilians were sheltering and struck a maternity hospital. In the wake of Moscow’s withdrawal from towns around Kyiv weeks ago, mass graves were discovered and streets were strewn with bodies in towns such as Bucha.
Ukrainian Prosecutor-General Iryna Venediktova previously said her office was readying war crimes cases against 41 Russian soldiers for offences that included bombing civilian infrastructure, killing civilians, rape and looting.
Investigators also are collecting evidence of possible war crimes to bring before the International Criminal Court in The Hague.
(With inputs from AP, Reuters)
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