This week in 2008 unknown assailants savagely attacked independent journalist Mikhail Beketov, an independent journalist who was among the first to report on and protest plans to build a highway through Moscow's Khimki forest. Left for dead, Beketov survived, barely. Doctors immediately amputated one leg and several fingers that were smashed. Two years later he is permanently paralyzed and unable to speak. On Wednesday, a Khimki court convicted Beketov of slander in a case brought by the town's Mayor in 2007. Beketov's attackers have not been found.
Click
here for coverage from the courtroom; and
here for a video of Beketov in his home and en route, via ambulance, to the courthouse. The
Committee to Protect Journalists has condemned the verdict saying, “It is sickening that Russia has convicted Mikhail Beketov while allowing the criminals who almost killed him two years ago walk free.”