The Skopje-based Criminal Court sentenced defendants Darko Kostovski and Mihail Panevski, creators of Telegram chat group “Public Room”, to four years in prison each, for production and distribution of child pornography, MIA reports.
According to the indictment, starting on December 19, 2019 up to January 28, 2020, the defendants, in the capacity of creator and administrator, were supposed to manage the textual and audio-visual content shared by the group members.
However, they allowed for child pornography content to become available in the group chat. ‘Public Room’ has since been closed. The prosecutor requested and the court approved an extension of the house arrest of the defendants due to a flight risk.
Earlier, the defense lawyers urged for cancellation of the measure, considering the defendants have been under house arrest for 13 months.
