Liza Drenicheva Ordered Released From Prison

Dan Fefferman
March 10, 2009

Dear all

An appeals court in Kazakhstan today ordered the release of Elizaveta Drenicheva, who has been in jail for the last two months on charges of spreading ethnic hatred by teaching the Divine Principle.

Although this represents good news, the judge did not overturning the guilty verdict... Rather the sentence was reduced from 2 years to time served. There will also be a small fine. Liza's lawyers and the church are still considering whether or not to appeal the ruling, since it leaves in place a precedent that the government can jail UC members simply for teaching DP.

Dan