Two Pussy Riot Members Sent To Prison Camp, One Freed

Yekaterina Samutsevich, the oldest of the three Pussy Riot members arrested and charged earlier in the year for charges pertaining to aggravated hooliganism, has been granted a two year suspended sentence and released on probation.

But the same can't be said for the other two women, 24-year-old Maria Alyokhina and 22-year-old Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, who were arrested during the "punk prayer" demonstration in February. After Samutsevich was freed by a Moscow court yesterday, it was ruled that the two other women were to have their prison sentences unchanged and will serve the remainder of their two year prison sentence in a Russian prison colony.

Samutsevich was granted probation after her new lawyers, who she enlisted at a previous hearing, successfully argued that, while she was present at Moscow's Christ The Saviour Cathedral when the demonstration happened this February, she was not one of the members on the altar of the church. All three women were previously found guilty and sentenced to two year in prison.

The Guardian reports that the detained members of the now infamous group were vocal at their latest hearing, saying that their beliefs had not changed and that they would not be silenced no matter what.

"We are sitting in jail for our political beliefs," Alyokhina told the court. "And these beliefs won't let me be quiet: if this verdict remains and we go to a prison colony for two years, we still won't be quiet. If we are in Mordovia or Siberia, we still won't be quiet, no matter how uncomfortable that is for you."

Alyokhina and Tolokonnikova, who both have young children, are expected to be transferred to penal colonies soon. They are set to be released in March, 2014.