The former governor of the Bank of Latvia Ilmārs Rimšēvičs has appealed the verdict of a court of first instance that sentenced him to 350 hours of community service for Covid-19 vaccination certificate forgery, as LETA was told by Riga City Court.
Now the case will be reviewed by Riga Regional Court. However, there is no concrete date as of yet.
Rimšēvičs was presented with charges for bribery of a person in exchange for a fake Covid-19 vaccination certificate, as well as use of said certificate.
According to the prosecution, he handed over EUR 400 through an intermediary to a person who was empowered to carry out state-paid vaccinations and document the fact of vaccination in order to carry out activities that could lead to obtaining a digital Covid-19 certificate in the e-Health system.
As a result, false information was entered into the e-health system that Rimšēvičs was allegedly vaccinated against Covid-19. Aware that the vaccination certificate was forged, he used it and moved freely during the Covid-19 pandemic.
LTV programme De Facto previously reported that the criminal case against Rimšēvičs also involves some doctor, a teacher who is also a covid-sceptic, as well as the now passed away head of the registry office.
Rimšēvičs does not admit his guilt and claims he was vaccinated for Covid-19. This, according to his defence attorney, is proved by sample analyses, which show that Rimšēvičs does have antibodies from both Covid-19 infection and after vaccination.