The Telmanovo District Court celebrated its anniversary in March. In the spring of 1967, a people's court was established in the village of Granitnoye in the Telmanovo district of the Donetsk region of the Ukrainian SSR. After Telmanovo received the status of a settlement of urban type in 1971, in 1972 the court moved there.
With the beginning of hostilities in the south, in August 2014, functioning of the Telmanovo District Court of the Donetsk region was suspended. The village of Telmanovo itself became crucial for the militia’s southing, therefore it was under fire and several times was passed from hand to hand. In September 2014, the district court stopped its work at all, for all the judges working there moved to the Ukrainian territory. However, the rest of the court staff refused to leave their native village.
This is how Elena Koloda, the Telmanovo District Court staff manager, recalls that difficult period:
Armed people came to my house several times and demanded to give the courthouse keys, therefore, in order to avoid looting, all computer and office equipment were taken to safe places, where we have been keeping it till the start of the work of the Telmanovo District Court of the DPR. Thus, all the equipment in the court was saved. In the fall of 2014, heating of the courthouse was cut off, and the building was not heated until January 2015, when the heating was finally turned on. However, immediately after the turning on, water pipes of the courthouse burst. Realizing that neither the judicial system of the Republic, which at that time had just been developed, nor the administration of the village had enough money to repair the heating system, the staff of the court decided to replace the pipes, as well as to buy stamps and pay telephone and Internet services bills on their own account.
Back in October 2014, employees of the Telmanovo district court of the Donetsk People's Republic held a meeting at which they participatory decided to file their letters of resignation from the judicial system of Ukraine and file employment applications to the Telmanovo district court of the Donetsk People's Republic.
February 18, 2015 can be considered the second birth of the Telmanovo Court – it was on this day that the staff of the court began its activities as the employees of the Telmanovo District Court of the Donetsk People's Republic.
Unfortunately, due to the fact that all the judges who had been working in Telmanovo earlier left their workplaces, the court staff had to go constantly to Donetsk to the Supreme Court of the DPR until April 2016 to determine the jurisdiction of the statements of claim and complaints with which people applied to the court, as well as to certify copies of court decisions. Finally, with the appointment of Boyko Nikolai Ivanovich to the position of the chairman of the court, the staff of the court finally was able to begin normal functioning.
The team, which has stood through an incredibly difficult period thanks to friendly and well-coordinated work, today is rightfully proud of its employees. To these belong the most experienced – Shabalda Larissa Viktorovna, lead specialist, whose total years of service in court exceed 28 years, Pavlenko Oleg Nikolaevich, acting main spesialist on judicial statistics, who has more than 20 years of experience in the judicial system, Koloda Elena Alexandrovna, acting court staff manager, who has more than 13 years of experience in the judicial system.
The court staff also include Korolpus’kaya Angelica Petrovna, assistant judge, Kuz’menko Olga Adamovna, lead specialist, Zhukova Irina Nikolaevna, assistant judge, and Sokirko Ilona Nikolaevna, court session secretary, all of them having more than 10 years of experience in the judicial system.
Boyko Nikolai Ivanovich, the Chairman of the court, and Svetlana Vladimirovna Minchenkova, court session secretary, have more than 6 years of judicial experience - and each of them deliberately chose to serve the people of the DPR.
The staff of the court is very responsible for their work, and difficult times only brought people together – so that now they celebrate holidays together, they also attend subbotniks (litter picks) – by their own means they bring the courthouse and its surroundings to order.
According to Nikolai Boyko, the Chairman of the Telmanovso District Court, who had served as a judge before 2014, significant changes concerning ethical standards can be distinguished in the style of the judicial system of the Donetsk People's Republic:
I would like to note that now judges have become much freer in rendering their decisions, they are not dictated "from above" what decisions to make, but at the same time it makes judges more responsible, makes them pass judgments more carefully, rationalize and think them over more carefully. Therefore, decisions are made based on legal norms, and not according to somebody’s orders.
Nikolai Ivanovich also told how he decided to stay with his people:
After September 2, when Ukrainian regime made all the judges of the "ATO zone" leave the territory of the DPR, we decided at the family council not go anywhere. I made my notice, which has been considered by the Ukrainian regime for about a year and a half. But I, a former Soviet border guard, a person who was trusted by the Soviet homeland to work in the State Bank, had nowhere to go from this land, from these people. By the way, none of the border guards of Makeyevka left.
