"90% of the witnesses in the Chervinsky case are testifying in his favor, but the investigators are ignoring this," said attorney Globa

Witnesses in the case of Colonel Roman Chervinsky are testifying in his favor.

Attorney Kostyantyn Hloba spoke about this in an interview with Censor.NET.

According to him, the defense is currently working to convey to the court the position that keeping Roman Chervinsky in custody is a legal absurdity.

“First, 90% of the witnesses in the case file speak in his favor. The investigation simply ignores this. During one of the hearings, I provided the judge with a table analyzing the discrepancies between what is written in the indictment and what the prosecution’s witnesses are saying. For example, the indictment alleges that Roman did a certain thing. Regarding this specific fact, a prosecution witness gives testimony indicating that Roman did not do it. Either other people did it, or it didn’t happen at all—it all depends on the situation. That’s the problem. And our role in court today boils down to making this point: “Just read it,” the defense attorney noted.

Globa stated that the defense is working 90% with the evidence gathered by the investigation.

“But if you set aside all the manipulative elements, 80% of the case materials support our position. That’s why we’re working with the materials of the criminal proceedings, and we’re working with the prosecution’s witnesses. Because they’re testifying in our favor,” he added.

Read the full text of the interview with attorney Kostyantyn Globa here.

Media reports indicated that Ukrainian military personnel had been recruiting a Russian pilot for several months to hijack an aircraft. According to media reports, Roman Chervinsky was among them. Subsequently, as noted by the SBU, the “operation” was carried out despite the SBU’s objections and without the consent of the relevant state authorities. As a result, the enemy obtained information about the deployment of Ukrainian Air Force personnel and Ukrainian aircraft at the Kanatove airfield. This enabled the Russian Armed Forces to shell the airfield.

Chervinsky later gave an exclusive interview to Censor.NET, in which he spoke about the operation at the Kanatove airfield.

In April 2023, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) announced that Chervinsky was a suspect in the case involving the occupiers’ shelling of the Kanatove airfield in the Kirovohrad region. He was detained in the Ternopil region.

Major General Viktor Hanushchak, under whose command the military unit was in which Colonel Chervinsky served as deputy commander, told Censor.NET in an interview that the operation at the Kanatove airfield had been approved by the senior leadership of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. However, the court refused to hear Hanushchak’s testimony and did not accept evidence in Chervinsky’s favor.

Roman Chervinsky was one of the intelligence officers who, in 2020, organized an operation to capture Russian mercenaries from the Wagner Group by luring them into Belarus. There, the mercenaries were supposed to board a plane that Ukrainian special services would later force to make an emergency landing in Ukraine. However, the operation fell through. On June 24, 2021, President Zelenskyy confirmed that a special operation targeting the “Wagnerites” was being prepared. Zelenskyy also stated that the special operation targeting the “Wagnerites” was the idea of other countries and that Ukraine had been drawn into the matter as much as possible.

In December 2021, intelligence officers Chervinsky and Semenyuk of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense revealed that the operation had been compromised. According to Chervinsky, several people from the Office of the President may have “leaked” information regarding the operation to detain the “Wagnerites.” He also said that the Office of the President had threatened the former intelligence officers with criminal proceedings.

On December 28, 2023, Colonel Roman Chervinsky was notified that he was suspected of attempting to embezzle 100,000 U.S. dollars by posing as an official of the State Fiscal Service.