Kherson City Court handed down a sentence to local educator Svitlana Ogurtsova for collaborationist activities.
This was revealed in the relevant court verdict.
As the investigation established, during the occupation of Kherson in the summer of 2022 Svitlana Ogurtsova assumed the illegal position of deputy director for educational and upbringing work at School No. 47.
From July to November 2022 she was engaged in integrating the educational process into the Russian legal framework. In particular, she personally called Ukrainian teachers, offering them to teach at the illegally established school, and in case of refusal demanded that they write resignation letters.
Ogurtsova also arranged the import and distribution of Russian textbooks from the “Prosvita” publishing house (Moscow, 2022), kept documentation according to Russian Federation standards, and also taught herself according to Russian curricula in primary grades.
Law enforcement officers seized Russian diplomas of Ogurtsova’s professional development, notebooks with notes of the “Academy of the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation”, copies of the RF law “On Education”, as well as records of payroll calculated in rubles.
Additionally the woman’s guilt was confirmed by witnesses – former colleagues from the school. In particular, a primary school teacher told the court how Ogurtsova called her at the end of July 2022 and urged her to collaborate. Another employee testified that she saw the accused collecting applications from parents to enroll children in the Russian school.
The court qualified the actions of Svitlana Ogurtsova under Part 3 of Article 111-1 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine – collaborationist activity.
She was sentenced to 3 years of imprisonment and a ban for 15 years on holding any positions in government bodies, local self-government and educational institutions, as well as on engaging in teaching and educational activities.
Earlier investigators of the Kherson region’s National Police announced suspicion against Natalia Vdovychenko, a resident of the Bilozerka community, who headed the school seized by the occupiers.