Nemtsov murder case suspects to request jury trial – lawyer

MOSCOW. Dec 29 (Interfax) – The suspects in the case opened into the murder of Russian opposition politician Boris Nemtsov intend to ask for a jury trial, one of the lawyers has said.

“Our position remains unchanged: Zaur Dadayev pleads not guilty. We will request a jury trial,” lawyer Shamshudin Tsakayev told Interfax on Tuesday.

The indictment says that the arrested suspects had lucrative motives, in other words they were hired to kill Nemtsov, he added.

Tsakayev told Interfax earlier on Tuesday that investigators had presented their final indictment to all persons arrested over the Nemtsov murder.

Nemtsov was assassinated on Bolshoi Moskvoretsky Bridge in central Moscow on February 27, 2015. The Russian Investigative Committee’s Main Investigations Department is probing the criminal case opened on charges of murder and illegal weapons turnover.

Moscow’s Basmanny District Court ruled to take five people implicated in the case, Zaur Dadayev, Anzor Gubashev, Khamzat Bakhayev, Shadid Gubashev and Temirlan Eskerkhanov, into custody.

Ruslan Mukhudinov, a member of the Sever (North) battalion of the Chechen Interior Ministry, has been charged with organizing the killing in absentia. The Basmanny Court arrested him in absentia on October 18 at investigators’ request.

Russian Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin told Interfax earlier on Tuesday that investigators expected on Tuesday to file their final indictment against Zaur Dadayev, Anzor and Shadid Gubashev, Temirlan Eskerkhanov and Khamzat Bakhayev for perpetrating this contract killing acting as an organized group, as well as illegally obtaining, transporting and storing firearms.

[featured image is file photo]