Finnish Appeals Court rejects Bazaramba’s retrial

A Finnish Court of Appeal, Friday, rejected a call from defence lawyers to return the case of Francois Bazaramba, a former clergyman sentenced to life for participating in the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, for a second hearing at the Eastern Uusimaa District Court. The Helsinki Appeals Court of Finland turned the demands of Bazaramba’s defence counsel that the case be returned to the lower court, claiming that there had been shortcomings in both the trial and the sentence, including a failure to take due account of evidence from defence witnesses. Bazaramba was convicted in June on charges of involvement in leading mass killings in his village in the spring of 1994. The defence argued that the presiding judge, Lars Karlsson, should have recused himself owing to personal bias against the defendant, and that the district court hearings had contained evidence that was elicited through torture, which should have been discounted in the handling of the case. The Court of Appeal ruled that there were no grounds for a retrial, and did not accept the argument that the presiding judge was unfit to hear the case. Bazaramba’s claims that witness statements were acquired through torture should be examined at the point when the Appeals Court considers the case made against the defendant. In June, the court in Porvoo handed down a life sentence to Bazaramba, believing him to have been responsible for involvement in a number of mass killings during the Genocide in 1994. The judgement was the first of its kind in Finland. Bazaramba, who settled in Finland in 2003, has been imprisoned or in police custody for more than three years. Both the prosecution and defence announced immediately after the June ruling that they would appeal the decision, and in October, the Helsinki Court of Appeals turned down a request by the pastor to be released pending his appeal. The prosecution expressed their own dissatisfaction with the lower court’s ruling, calling for convictions on certain counts on which the District Court had acquitted the accused. Earlier this year, Finish Judges travelled to Rwanda, where, in collaboration with the National Public Prosecution Authority, lined up witnesses to testify against Bazaramba. Bazaramba, 50, a former clergyman with the Baptist Church in Rwanda, was charged with and sentenced for masterminding the killing of over 5,000 people who had sought refuge at Nyakizu Hill, in the Southern Province, during the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. Ends