Gapšys to appeal conditional release ruling, seeks different court

Former Lithuanian MP Vytautas Gapšys, who is serving a prison sentence, plans to appeal a decision denying his conditional release and will ask for the case to be heard by another court, LRT reported.

Gapšys said on Thursday that he would submit an appeal to the Kaunas Regional Court against a ruling by the Kaunas District Court, which refused to approve the Conditional Release Commission’s decision to release him on parole.

About a year and a half remains until the end of his sentence. Gapšys said that 145 days remained until February 1, 2027, when conditional release would have to be applied to him and court approval would no longer be required.

The Conditional Release Commission had decided to grant him conditional release. Gapšys said the district court acknowledged that he met both legal criteria: he had served the required portion of his sentence and his risk of criminal behaviour was low.

However, he said the court refused to approve the decision based on requirements not set out in the Code of Execution of Sentences, including a change in risk despite the risk already being assessed as low, an “exceptionally positive character assessment” and his failure to admit guilt.

Gapšys said his appeal cited earlier decisions by the Kaunas Regional Court that had overturned district court rulings based on similar arguments.

He also questioned a practice introduced at the Kaunas Regional Court earlier this year, under which conditional release cases are heard by a panel of three judges. According to Gapšys, such cases in Kaunas were heard by a single judge in 2025, while publicly available decisions indicate that the Vilnius Regional Court still follows that approach.

Gapšys said he would first seek to have the case transferred to another regional court and ask Kaunas Regional Court judges to recuse themselves. He also intends to ask the court to refer the issue to Lithuania’s Constitutional Court, arguing that the courts’ interpretation of conditional release rules conflicts with the Constitution.

Gapšys has been imprisoned since November 2023, when the Lithuanian Court of Appeal found him guilty. In October 2024, the Supreme Court of Lithuania upheld his conviction and sentenced him to four years and three months in prison.

He was convicted of obtaining a 12,100-euro discount on political advertising for the Labour Party and a 15,000-euro donation to the organisation Meno ir sporto projektai after promising to carry out actions requested by businessman Raimondas Kurlianskis, who is also imprisoned.

Former MP Eligijus Masiulis was also sentenced to prison in the MG Group political corruption case. He and Kurlianskis have likewise sought early release, but courts have not granted their requests.

Former MPs Šarūnas Gustainis and Gintaras Steponavičius, as well as the Liberal Movement, Labour Party and MG Group, were also convicted in the case. The defendants were fined a total of about 1.8 million euros.