“Freedom for Levon Hayrapetyan”, a civic group supporting the Armenian businessman sentenced yesterday to four years for embezzling $700,000 from the mother of Igor Izmestyev (a former senator from the Russian Republic of Bashkortostan serving a life sentence on terrorism and other charges), reports that the gravely ill Hayrapetyan has been transferred to a jail cell so small that the inmates have to sleep in shifts.

The court found that Hayrapetyan, a native of Karabakh, had tricked the mother of Izmestyev to pay him the money in return for a promise to wrangle a more lenient sentence for her son.

The civic group says that Hayrapetyan’s lawyer has already appealed the court decision to transfer Hayrapetyan to another cell in Moscow’s Butyrskaya Prison.

The group says given Hayrapetyan’s health, he’s suffered several strokes and is said to have cancer, transferring him to a smaller cell puts Hayrapetyan’s life in danger.

The group also lambasts the Armenia community in Russia for remaining silent on the matter.