The court satisfied the claim of the notorious former head of the Foreign Intelligence Service, Serhiy Semochko, and ordered journalists who reported on the Russian citizenship and substantial property of his family to refute this information.
In court, Semochko stated that he does not consider the individuals mentioned in the investigation to be his relatives. In particular, this refers to his wife, stepson, stepdaughter, and others. All of them hold Russian passports issued in the occupied territory of Crimea. Furthermore, the 'non-relatives' of the intelligence officer own a number of real estate properties in Kozyn, near Kyiv, as reported by INKORR.com
The case was in court for over a year, during which witnesses were interrogated, and state registers were examined. Journalists claim that they demonstrated in court how to verify the existence of Russian passports for individuals that Semochko does not consider his relatives. However, later the judge recused himself, and the case was handed over to another judge, Yuriy Mazur. In one hearing, he ruled to satisfy the controversial official’s demands and ordered the investigators to refute several quotes from the report and subsequent broadcasts.
As noted by Bihus.info, the court simply did not accept the evidence regarding citizenship because Semochko claimed not to classify these individuals as relatives in the legal sense of the Family Code; thus, for him, family only includes his wife and son, but not the others.
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Importantly, although Semochko referred to his wife as a relative, the court decided that information regarding her citizenship and assets also needed to be refuted.
In addition, the ruling states that journalists must refute phrases not belonging to the authors of the report, which are testimonies from third parties, phrases that do not mention Semochko, artistic devices, and evaluative judgments based on official documents.
The court issued this ruling on September 10; however, the full text was not provided or published. The story's author, Lesya Ivanova, only received it on October 16. Subsequently, an appeal was filed within the legally defined time frame. However, at that time, Judge Mazur issued an enforcement order for mandatory compliance with the court's decision— to refute and pay Semochko's court costs. Journalists believe that the judge grossly violated the rights of the defendants. Currently, a private executor has blocked the accounts of the channel, program host Denys Bigus, and author Lesya Ivanova based on this order.