The court thus satisfied the prosecution's cassation. The defense will appeal against the Supreme Court verdict, says Yuri Kostanov, one of the suspects' lawyer.
The prosecution approves the acquittal quashed, its counsels said to newsmen after the court session.
"The prosecution greets organ transplantation and its progress. We fully understand the agony of patients in waiting for organs to be transplanted them - yet we want transplantations not to trespass others' rights and interests," said prosecutor Alexander Remezov.
In a verdict of March 1, the Moscow city court completely acquitted the doctors who had found themselves in the dock for allegedly illegal organ transplantations in hospital No. 20. "The examination during trial found no proof of the defendants' guilt," the court said in a statement.
The prosecution accused doctors and other employees of the Transplantological Center of plotting to murder one Orekhov, a patient brought to the hospital admission room, April 11, 2003, with "closed craniocerebral injury" diagnosed.
As court hearings were on, the prosecutor demanded a 8.5 year prison term for Irina Lirtzman, hospital No. 20 intensive care ward chief, eight years for Dr. Lyubov Pravdenko of the ward, and nine years for each of the two doctors of the Moscow Organ Donation Coordination Center-Pyotr Pyatnichuk and Bairma Shakdurova.
As the court established, however, the doctors started preparing transplantation surgery only after the patient's death was definitely established.
The city court fully acquitted the defendants, and revoked their written pledge not to leave the city, said the verdict.
