The Minsk District Court has handed down a verdict in the case of a married couple who acted as drug couriers. They were given lengthy prison sentences. Four other defendants in the case received more lenient sentences.
According to the Prosecutor General’s Office, under the prosecution’s version, a 43-year-old woman from Minsk and her 48-year-old husband “as part of an organized group, illegally acquired, stored, transported and sold particularly dangerous psychotropic substances and narcotic drugs in large quantities.” They sold psychoactive substances to 14 individuals. Four people died from methadone poisoning in 2023–2024.
During the arrest, 102 packages containing methadone with a total weight of more than 40 grams were seized from the couple. At their place of residence, additional stashes were discovered containing 594 grams of mephedrone, about 792 grams of hashish, 382 grams of methadone and around 6 grams of alpha-PVP.
The court sentenced the 43-year-old woman to 23 years and six months of imprisonment to be served in a general-regime penal colony. The 48-year-old man was sentenced to 24 years and one month of imprisonment in a high-security penal colony, with a five-year ban on driving. Each of them was also fined 700 base units (29,400 rubles). Income obtained through criminal activity was also confiscated in favor of the state.
“The four other defendants — residents of Minsk and the Minsk region — at various times illegally acquired and stored, without intent to sell, the particularly dangerous narcotic drug methadone, using the services of the above-mentioned online shops. They received the prohibited substances through ‘stashes’ prepared by the married couriers and continued to keep them until their detention,” the prosecutor’s office said.
Two defendants were sentenced to two years and six months and four years of imprisonment, respectively. The other two received sentences of restriction of liberty without placement in an open-type correctional facility for a period of three years each.
The verdict has not yet entered into legal force and may be appealed or protested in appellate proceedings.