Despite having been acquitted of hate speech twice, Finnish MP Päivi Räsänen may still have to face another day in court on the same charges.
The Finnish public prosecutor has appealed the case to the country’s supreme court.
Räsänen, who has been a member of parliament since 1995 and also served as minister of the interior from 2011 to 2015, was formally charged with “agitation against a minority group” in 2021 under a section of the Finnish criminal code titled “war crimes and crimes against humanity”.
The charges centered on a 2019 tweet of Romans 1:24-27, a 2019 live radio debate, and a 2004 church pamphlet titled “Male and Female He Created Them: Homosexual relationships challenge the Christian concept of humanity” in which Räsänen argued against gay marriage on the basis of her Christian faith. Bishop Juhana Pohjola was also charged for publishing Räsänen’s 2004 pamphlet and was acquitted as well.
According to Paul Coleman, executive director of ADF International and a member of Räsänen’s legal team, the case garnered global media attention and was also one of the most closely followed news stories in Finland.
Räsänen won both the first trial and an appeal, the latest court case concluding last November. In the latest ruling, the appeals court found that it “has no reason, on the basis of the evidence received at the main hearing, to assess the case in any respect differently from the District Court. There is therefore no reason to alter the final result of the District Court’s judgment.”
However, the public prosecutor immediately pledged to appeal again to the Supreme Court, which they did earlier this week.
It remains to be seen whether the court will take up the case. As there have already been two consistent rulings, it seems unlikely, according to Coleman, but the entire case has been fuelled by questionable legal interpretations.
“One would think she [the prosecutor] would have to come up with something new and it’s clear that there are no new arguments to be made here,” Coleman explained to The European Conservative last November. “That doesn’t mean to say that it will be the end of the road because what we have sadly seen throughout this whole four-year ordeal is that it has been a somewhat ideological process. And when ideology is driving it, what is a rational decision goes out of the window to a degree.”
In a statement on the recent appeal filing by the Finnish prosecutor, Coleman reiterated his skepticism that the prosecutor has a worthy case:
The state’s insistence on continuing this prosecution despite such a clear and unanimous ruling by both the Helsinki District Court and Court of Appeal is alarming. Dragging people through the courts for years, subjecting them to hour-long police interrogations, and wasting taxpayer money in order to police people’s deeply held beliefs has no place in a democratic society. As is so often the case in “hate speech” trials, the process has become the punishment.
For her part, Räsänen said she was ready to face further trials with courage:
After my full exoneration in two courts, I’m not afraid of a hearing before the Supreme Court. Even though I am fully aware that every trial carries risks, an acquittal from the Supreme Court would set an even stronger positive precedent for everyone’s right to free speech and religion. And if the Court decided to overturn the lower courts’ acquittals, I am ready to defend freedom of speech and religion as far as the European Court of Human Rights, if necessary.
