Appeals court to decide Ramanauskas monument case

LRT reports that Lithuania’s Court of Appeal will announce its decision on Tuesday in the case over the desecration of a monument to partisan commander Adolfas Ramanauskas-Vanagas.

Only one of the three convicted men, Russian citizen Anton Patrakov, has appealed. The Kaunas Regional Court sentenced him to four years in prison, the harshest sentence imposed on the three foreigners in December. Patrakov is seeking an acquittal.

The first-instance court found that Patrakov had acted with the main organisers of the crimes. It sentenced dual Estonian and Russian citizen Nikolai Silin to three years in prison and dual Estonian and Russian citizen Konstantin Venkov to two and a half years. Their convictions are final.

The three men were convicted of helping another state act against Lithuania, damaging property and desecrating a grave or another place of public respect.

The court found that Silin and Patrakov helped people acting in the interests of Russia’s military intelligence service, the GRU, by carrying out vandalism against the monument. Venkov helped by collecting information about the monument and other public memorial sites.

The monument in Merkinė, Varėna district, was covered in red paint in January 2024. The court ordered the defendants jointly to pay Merkinė City Museum 1,500 euros in damages.