Moscow, May 8 (IANS/RIA Novosti): A Moscow court has sentenced a man to 15 years in prison for killing a convicted murderer and war criminal.

The Moscow City Court Tuesday sentenced Yusup Temerkhanov, who will serve his sentence in a high-security prison.

The court ruled Temerkhanov's guilt was established beyond any doubt and he did not deserve leniency.
His lawyer said he would appeal the verdict.

“The guilty verdict was obtained by hook and by crook, mainly by crook,” lawyer Murad Musayev said.

Furthermore, the judge broke the law when sentencing by indicating personal hatred as a motive for the killing, Musayev said.

The jury had not found enough evidence to uphold the prosecutors’ argument that the murder was motivated by hatred of all Russian servicemen who had fought in Chechnya.

Last Monday, the jury had convicted Temerkhanov, a Chechen native, of killing Budanov, a former colonel.

Budanov, 47, was killed in Moscow in June 2011, two years after his early release from prison, where he had served most of a 10-year sentence for kidnapping and killing an 18-year-old in a Chechan village in March 2000.

Temerkhanov shot Budanov eight times and set a getaway car on fire to destroy all the evidence of his involvement in the crime, prosecutors said.