MOSCOW, November 3. /TASS/. Moscow’s Nikulinsky court sentenced a group of obstetricians and surrogate mothers to various terms from between 4 and 19.5 years in prison on charges of trafficking of newborns.
"Declare Tars Ashitkov, Tatyana Blinova, Yuliana Ivanova, Liliya Panaioti, Liliya Valeyeva guilty under Criminal Code Article 127.1 part 3 (human trafficking carried out within an organized group), and sentence Ashitkov to 17.5 years in a maximum security prison, Blinova - to 4 years in a medium-security prison, Ivanova - to 16.5 years in a medium-security prison, Panaioti - to 16 years in a medium-security facility, Valeyeva - to 10.5 years in prison," Judge Konstantin Dubkov announced.
The obstetricians were also prohibited from working in the medical field for 3 years after their terms are over.
The court also sentenced Vladislav Melnikov, director of the "European center of surrogate motherhood" to 19.5 years in a maximum security facility. He was found guilty of 17 counts of child trafficking.
Ashitkov is a urologist at the NGC private clinic; Ivanova and Panaioti are obstetricians involved in providing in vitro fertilization services in Moscow; Blinova and Valeyeva are surrogate mothers. An international arrest warrant was issued for the main defendant in the case, Konstantin Svitnev, and he was arrested in absentia; surrogate mother Irina Kolgut was also arrested in absentia and put on a wanted list.
The criminal case was initiated in January of last year over charges of causing death by negligence, after the body of a newborn boy was found in an apartment in the VNIISSOK settlement. Last summer, five infants aged between six days and six months were found in an apartment with two women tending to them. The investigators opened a criminal case of human trafficking. Later, the case was classified under a more severe criminal code article, and handed over to the Central Apparatus of the Investigative Committee of Russia. Law enforcement officials detained a female Chinese citizen, who was present in the apartment with the infants. According to a TASS source in law enforcement, these children were born by surrogate mothers and were intended, inter alia, for Chinese citizens.