The Prosecutor's Office of Lepel District supported the state prosecution against a 41-year-old resident of the city of Vitebsk – he is charged with desecration of the State Flag of the Republic of Belarus.
During the court investigation, it was established that a previously unconvicted 41-year-old resident of Vitebsk, while in a state of alcoholic intoxication in the center of Lepel, near an administrative building, in plain sight of bystanders, with the intent to desecrate the state symbol of the Republic of Belarus – the State Flag of the Republic of Belarus, thereby expressing an offensive attitude towards the state symbols of the Republic of Belarus, jumped up and tore off with his hands the wooden flagpole with the State Flag of the Republic of Belarus attached to it, mounted on the wall of the said building in a metal bracket, while tearing off the bracket from its mounting place and damaging the wooden flagpole, after which he took the State Flag of the Republic of Belarus with the flagpole to Volodarskogo Street in Lepel, where he left it on the street and fled.
The accused M. fully admitted his guilt in committing the crime imputed to him at the court hearing, and sincerely repented of the committed crime.
Taking into account the evidence presented by the state prosecutor, the court rendered a guilty verdict. Based on Article 370 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Belarus, the man was sentenced to restriction of liberty for a term of 1 year and 6 months without being sent to an open-type correctional institution.
The court's verdict has not entered into legal force and may be appealed and protested.
Senior Assistant
Prosecutor of Lepel District K.V. Grishkevich