Olesya Yugova has now been sentenced and released after spending more than a year in custody on remand and then pleading guilty to 24 charges of threatening to kill and two of burglary.
Yugova’s offending occurred between September 2022 and January 2023, and involved two groups of people and a further individual, court documents show. All the names and identifying details of the victims were suppressed.
The first group were relatives of her late husband’s lawyer.
A decision from the High Court at Auckland says Yugova formed an “irrational belief” that the lawyer had caused or contributed to her husband’s death for his own monetary gain.
She posted threats on social media threatening to harm members of the lawyer’s family “in vile and violent terms”, the decision said.
Two of the victims were elderly and vulnerable.
Yugova went to the home of some of the victims, poured paint on cars parked in their garage and threw rocks at the property, breaking two windows.
The second group of victims were members of another extended family. They were also harassed in social media posts.
The individual victim had a disagreement with Yugova at the Auckland City Mission. Yugova then posted threats and incited violence against that person on social media.
High Court Justice Tracey Walker said Yugova’s threats and other behaviour had caused the victims stress, anxiety and fear, particularly as the threats targeted extended family members, including young children.
“I have no doubt that Ms Yugova’s obsessive pursuit of the victims has had a significant emotional toll on them,” Justice Walker said.
“This was serious offending by any measure.”
Yugova was in custody from January 27, 2023, until her sentencing in the North Shore District Court on March 1, 2024 - a total of 399 days.
During that time she went through a number of lawyers and received a sentencing indication of 21 months in prison.
The District Court judge said Yugova’s “bizarre and over the top” offending suggested possible psychological issues, unresolved anger and grief.
Because people who are sentenced to less than two years in jail usually only serve half their time, Yugova expected she would be released on time served.
This also meant she could expect to be subject only to the statutory six months of release conditions that follow a short jail term, under the supervision of a probation officer.
She was instead sentenced to two years of intensive supervision beginning on her sentencing date - effectively a more restrictive sentence than the one she had been expecting.
She appealed her sentence to the High Court.
“Ms Yugova contends that she accepted the indication on the basis that time spent remanded in custody would mean that she would be released,” Justice Walker said.
“She argues that, although a sentence of supervision is a lesser sentence in terms of the sentencing hierarchy, in her unique circumstances, the sentence was practically more restrictive.”
Justice Walker said the length of time spent in custody on remand before Yugova was sentenced led her to the conclusion that intensive supervision for 24 months was a further “undue restriction” on her liberty.
She said this was “not justified on the present material before the court”.
Justice Walker quashed the supervision sentence and replaced it with one of 21 months of imprisonment, with six months of release conditions.
As Yugova spent so long in prison on remand, she has already served her time.
Her release conditions include a ban on accessing social media and a psychological assessment.
Ric Stevens spent many years working for the former New Zealand Press Association news agency, including as a political reporter at Parliament, before holding senior positions at various daily newspapers. He joined NZME’s Open Justice team in 2022 and is based in Hawke’s Bay. His writing in the crime and justice sphere is informed by four years of frontline experience as a probation officer.
