Ukraine: a woman who introduced herself in a café as someone who tells the future and can remove curses was convicted of defrauding two women in Kremenets

Proceedings

1. 2017-03-20 · conviction and sentence at first instance

   Kremenets District Court, Ternopil Oblast, Ukraine (Кременецький районний суд Тернопільської області). The defendant, anonymised in the published judgment as ОСОБА_4, was convicted of fraud under parts 1 and 2 of article 190 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine in respect of two victims. Fines of fifty tax-free minimum incomes (850 hryvnia) and one hundred (1,700 hryvnia) were imposed on the two counts, cumulated under part 1 of article 70 to a final penalty of 1,700 hryvnia. The court approved a reconciliation agreement concluded between the accused and both victims on the day of judgment. It found that on 1 February 2017 the defendant entered the Kozatskyi Kurin café-bar in Kremenets and introduced herself to the first victim 'as a person who tells about the future and can remove a curse by divination'; that, 'taking advantage of the trusting features of her character and her friendly relations', she told her a curse had been laid on her; and that at a further meeting at the same café on 6 February she promised to remove it. The losses were assessed at 370 hryvnia and 1,967.40 hryvnia.

Documented coercion mechanisms

• an approach to a stranger in a café, introducing herself as able to foretell the future and remove curses
• the assertion that a curse had been laid on the victim
• repeated meetings at which trust was built and the deception maintained