On the prosecutor’s motion, the Chechelivskyi District Court of Dnipro on 20 April 2026, in case No. 243/4706/24, extended Metropolitan Arseniy’s round-the-clock house arrest, without electronic monitoring, to 20 June 2026; the court had chosen this measure on 25 February in place of custody. Under the ruling, the Metropolitan may leave his home only to reach the nearest shelter during an air-raid alert and to receive medical care, and must then return at once.
The defence asked for the round-the-clock arrest to be replaced with a personal obligation or an arrest at night only — one of them proposed a ban on leaving home from 22:00 to 05:00 — and a lawyer and a people’s deputy offered personal surety for the Metropolitan.
The court refused: according to the ruling, the risks the prosecutor pointed to — hiding from the court, unlawfully influencing witnesses and experts, a new offence or continuing the charged acts — had not diminished, and two months of compliance does not automatically justify a milder measure; surety, in the court’s view, would not secure his procedural conduct.
On the risk of a new offence the ruling states that, without this measure, the Metropolitan, in the court’s view, would with high probability be able to conduct church rites and deliver church speeches in the presence of clergy and parishioners, which points to the possibility of continuing the charged acts.
The court also granted the defence’s application for the return of the bail: the money paid into the Dnipro Court of Appeal’s deposit account under its ruling of 23 October 2025 is to be returned to those who paid it — the ruling lists sixteen persons. According to the ruling, the bail had in effect ceased to apply once custody was replaced with house arrest. The ruling cannot be appealed; the court announced only its operative part, and the full text was drawn up on 24 April.
The Svyatogirsk Holy Dormition Lavra, whose superior is Metropolitan Arseniy, said, as Suspilne Donbas and Ukrinform relayed, that the Metropolitan may attend all medical procedures without a special court permit.
Sources: Unified State Register of Court Decisions, case No. 243/4706/24: ruling of 20 April 2026, full text; same register: operative part; Suspilne Donbas, 23 April 2026; Ukrinform, 21 April 2026.
