Ukraine: a woman who approached shoppers in a Lviv shopping centre claiming skill at removing curses, taking gold on the promise it would be returned after the rite

Proceedings

1. 2014-04-30 · conviction and sentence at first instance

   Lychakivskyi District Court of Lviv, Ukraine (Личаківський районний суд м. Львова). The defendant, anonymised in the published judgment as ОСОБА_9, was convicted of fraud under part 1 of article 190 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine and of fraud on an aggravated basis under part 2, receiving a fine of fifty tax-free minimum incomes (850 hryvnia) on the first count and two years' deprivation of liberty on the second. The lesser penalty was absorbed into the greater under article 70, and she was then released from serving the sentence on probation under article 75 with a three-year probation period and specified obligations. On the first count the court found that in mid-April 2011, in the VAM shopping centre on vul. Vyhovskoho in Lviv, she gained the victim's confidence 'having convinced her that she possessed the skills of removing a curse', obtained a gold chain and a gold cross together worth 1,500 hryvnia, and — knowing she would not return them — 'by abuse of confidence convinced the victim that she would return them after the corresponding rite of removing the curse had been performed', appropriating them instead. The judgment sets out further counts on the same pattern.

Documented coercion mechanisms

• approaches to strangers in a shopping centre
• the claim to possess skill in removing curses
• a promise that gold handed over would be returned once the removal rite had been performed