Story in NPR:
Innocent until proven guilty: It's a bedrock principle in Western democracies. Not so, it seems, in Russia, where defendants go to trial expecting to be found guilty. They're just hoping for a lenient sentence.
That's why few Russians were surprised when Mikhail Khodorkovsky, once Russia's richest man, was convicted of embezzlement and sentenced last month to prison for a second term.
Once the head of a giant oil company, Khodorkovsky, 47, is now modern Russia's most famous prisoner. He spoke out against the Kremlin, was arrested and was sent to prison in 2003. Just as Khodorkovsky was about to complete that sentence, a judge convicted him in December of embezzlement and money laundering; he'll stay locked up in Siberia until 2017.
Khodorkovsky's 25-year-old son, Pavel Khodorkovsky, who lives in New York and hasn't seen his father in seven years, wishes more people paid attention to the case.
"My dad's case is a very good illustration of one simple fact: There is no rule of law, no working judicial system in Russia," he said in an interview last year.
