MOSCOW, August 25 (RAPSI) - The Izmaylovsky District Court of Moscow on Wednesday postponed the hearing of a case against excommunicated ex-schema monk Sergius (Nikolay Romanov) over inducement to suicide and usurpation of power until September 2, the Moscow City Court’s press service told RAPSI.

The trial was adjourned due to the witnesses’failure to appear in court.

Romanov was placed in detention in December 2020. He stands charged with inducing a minor to commit suicide. Earlier, Russia’s Children Ombudsman Anna Kuznetsova petitioned the Prosecutor General’s Office and the Investigative Committee to launch a probe into allegations of child abuse in a nunnery situated near town of Sredneuralsk in the Sverdlovsk Region, where the former schema monk took refuge.

Moreover, he is accused of violating a right to freedom of thought, conscience and and religionarbitrary behavior.

He denies his guilt.

His Holiness the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Kirill approved a decision of the church court of the Yekaterinburg eparchy to excommunicate schema monk Sergius (Romanov) on October 19.