Five found guilty in killing of Russian opposition leader

Supporters of Nemtsov say masterminds have not been brought to justice

A jury convicted five men Thursday in the assassination of opposition leader Boris Nemtsov on a bridge near the Kremlin two years ago, ending a trial that his supporters said had failed to bring the true masterminds of the brazen killing to justice.

The shooting death so close to Red Square sent shock waves through the Russian opposition, which had looked to the former deputy prime minister and fierce critic of President Vladimir Putin as a rising reformer who could negotiate with authorities.

After two days of deliberations at the end of a nine-month trial, the jury at a Moscow court found Zaur Dadayev guilty of killing Nemtsov. Dadayev was a former officer in the security forces of Chechnya’s leader, Ramzan Kadyrov.

Four other men were convicted of involvement in the killing.

Prosecutors said the four helped obtain the murder weapons and drove the shooter to the crime scene. Investigators said they never established who ordered Nemtsov’s assassination.

Prosecutors are expected to announce the sentences they are seeking at a hearing next week.

Nemtsov, 55, was shot late on the night of Feb. 27, 2015, as he was walking across the Bolshoy Moskovetsky Bridge just outside the Kremlin. A few hours before his death, he had conducted a radio in- terview in which he denounced Putin for his “mad, aggressive” policies in the crisis in Ukraine.

The images of Nemtsov’s body lying on the sidewalk with the domes of St. Basil’s Cathedral towering behind sent a message to many in the opposition, who had faced persecution and arrests, of just how precarious their position was.

Ilya Yashin, Nemtsov’s close ally, echoed that sentiment after the verdict. “Political murders in Russia will continue if the masterminds of this attack are able to get away with this,” Yashin told reporters.

Nemtsov’s killing was the biggest political assassination in Russia since 2006, when another Kremlin foe, journalist Anna Politkovskaya, was shot to death in the elevator of her Moscow apartment building on Putin’s birthday. Five Chechens were convicted in the case.

The site on the bridge where Nemtsov was killed has become a shrine, with supporters placing candles, fresh flowers and framed photos of the politician on the sidewalk where he fell.