Prague court convicts foreigners of forgery

Prague, Jan 14 (CTK) - The Prague 2 district court yesterday meted out a verdict for a group of foreigners for forgery of documents, but the charge that they helped commit a terrorist attack by the Islamist organisation Jamaat Shariat was not proved.

The verdict of three to five years in prison has not taken effect. The case is exceptional in that the police used a clause of the law on the support to terrorism for the first time in the Czech Republic.

Three defendants appealed instantly, while the remaining four and the state attorney may do so later.

The court punished some of the defendants for criminal conspiracy and some as an organised group operating in several countries.

According to the indictment, the group, consisting of four persons from Dagestan, two from Bulgaria and one from Moldova, was involved in the manufacturing and distribution of forged documents for the citizens of Dagestan in 2008-2010.

They stayed in Germany and were connected with terrorists, the state attorney said.

Each of the defendants fulfilled a role of their own. Some ordered or manufactured false documents, others transferred money to the Caucasus, he added.

Out of the seven people who worked in the forgery workshop, four knew that the documents and proceeds from them ended up in the hands of terrorists, the police said.

The detectives said the forgeries were very good and the group was able to create a complete identity of a person. For this it used copies of stamps of various authorities, the police said.

In a routine check, the police would be hardly able to find out that the documents were false, the state attorney said, adding that the perpetrators produced tens of false documents.

Some of the defendants have confessed to the forgery, but the four have denied any support to terrorists.

However, the court has changed the legal qualification from that proposed by the state attorney.

Along with forgery, it punished some of them for criminal conspiracy and the rest for crime committed by an organised group.

The court imposed a five-year prison sentence on two defendants as they most contributed to the work of the group.

Three defendants are to spend four years behind bars, two defendants three years and one of them is also sentenced to a ten-year expulsion from the Czech Republic.

Court panel chairwoman Zuzana Zapalkova said the group had almost operated as a business company.

She ruled it out that the court proceedings had proved that the group supported terrorism as claimed by the police and state attorney.

"On the other hand, there is much circumstantial evidence that the defendants are members of a terrorist organisation," she added.

The defence counsel for one of the defendants denied any wrongdoing, arguing that the indictment was based on fictitious surmises.