According to Blabbermouth, Behemoth member Nergal will be tried again for his previously reported charges of blasphemy, involving calling the Roman Catholic Church “the most murderous cult on the planet” and stripping pages from a Bible onstage. A higher court in Gdańsk, Poland, has rejected the ruling of surprisingly even-handed Judge Krzysztof Wieckowski, who called the frontman’s antics “a form of art.” His maximum sentence will be twp years in prison (now a third of the time it has been since the incident itself, which took place in 2007).
So, for those just now happening upon this story, the simple chronological version of the saga is as follows:
- Incident occurs onstage in 2007.
- Nergal is formally charged on 3/8/10. (Or I guess 8/3/10 probably if you’re Polish, but let’s not let that mess up the chronology.)
- He’s cleared of the charges a year later.
- The ruling is countermanded in late 2012 and shipped back down to a lower court.
- The European Commission defends Nergal publicly, calling the ruling against him “blasphemy.” Boom.
- And now the court has declared that he in fact committed a crime.
All this after his surviving Leukemia, mind. We now await the official declaration of his sentence. In the meantime, enjoy the gleeful abomination that is this band.
