Russian fighter seeks new appeal after Finnish court cuts Ukraine war crimes sentence from life to 12½ years

Voislav Torden, formerly known as Jan Petrovsky and associated with the Russian far-right paramilitary group Rusich, has applied for permission to challenge the Helsinki Court of Appeal's ruling, Finnish public broadcaster Yle reported on November 8.

In August 2026, the appeals court sentenced Torden to 12 and a half years for three war crimes, overturning the life sentence handed down by a lower court in March 2025.

The case concerns a September 5, 2014, attack on Ukrainian soldiers from the Aidar Battalion in the Luhansk region of eastern Ukraine, during the early stages of Russia's war against Ukraine.

The attack left 22 Ukrainian soldiers dead and four others wounded, according to evidence examined by the Finnish court.

Why his life sentence was reduced

In March 2025, the Helsinki District Court found Torden guilty of four war crimes, including responsibility for the killing of a wounded Ukrainian soldier.

The court determined that Torden, who served as Rusich's deputy commander, bore responsibility for the killing even if another member of the group had carried it out.

It also found him partly responsible for failing to intervene when a Ukrainian soldier's cheek was cut with the group's symbol, and established that he had taken and circulated degrading photographs of a dead soldier.

However, the lower court rejected a separate charge that Torden had organized and led the ambush, finding insufficient evidence that Rusich alone was responsible for planning and carrying out the attack.

On appeal, the court concluded that Torden had fired a machine gun at Ukrainian troops but found insufficient evidence to hold him responsible for the shooting of wounded soldiers.

It also rejected the war crimes charge concerning the injury to a soldier's cheek and did not uphold the lower court's findings on his command responsibility for the killings.

The appeals court nevertheless convicted him of three war crimes and imposed a prison sentence of 12 and a half years.

Torden denies the charges against him.

A landmark Finnish war crimes case

Torden was arrested in Finland in July 2023 after authorities identified him despite his use of a different name.

Ukraine sought his extradition, but Finland's Supreme Court refused, citing concerns about prison conditions and the risk that he would not receive a fair trial in Ukraine.

Finnish prosecutors subsequently pursued the case under international law.

The March 2025 ruling was Finland's first conviction for war crimes committed during Russia's war in Ukraine. The district court also determined that an international armed conflict had existed in eastern Ukraine since spring 2014.

Finnish prosecutors said investigators had gathered extensive evidence, including authentic video footage and testimony from survivors of the attack.

Torden's latest application seeks permission to appeal the August ruling. It does not mean that Finland's Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case or that his sentence has been changed again.