Dina Kaminskaya

Dina Isaakovna Kaminskaya (13 January 1919, - 7 July 2006) was a lawyer and human rights activist in the Soviet Union who was forced to emigrate in 1977 to avoid arrest. She and her husband moved to the United States. She was born in Yekaterinoslav.

The writer Yuli Daniel engaged Kaminskaya as his lawyer when, in December 1965, he was prosecuted with Andrei Sinyavsky, but the state refused to allow her to speak up in court on his behalf. She went on to defend - as far as the Soviet authorities would let her in a legal system designed as an instrument of Soviet power - Vladimir Bukovsky in 1967. She also defended Yuri Galanskov (who would die in a Soviet labour camp), Anatoli Marchenko (who would also die in camp), Larisa Bogoraz and Pavel Litvinov, and the Crimean Tatar activist Mustafa Jemilev.

Kaminskaya was prevented from defending Bukovsky in his 1971 trial and Sergei Kovalyov in 1975. In 1977, after being stripped of her license to practice as a lawyer, she was barred from defending Anatoli Shcharansky.

Singer Yuly Kim estimated the efforts and honesty of Dina Kaminskaya and very few other defenders who insisted that there is no any criminal element in actions of their clients accused in the anti-soviet propaganda.^[1]

Kaminskaya's book Final Judgment: my life as a Soviet defense attorney, was published in English in 1982 ^[2]

The recent publication of Stars of Advocacy^[3] qualifies Dina Kaminskaya and Sofia Kallistratova as stars of the legal profession in Soviet Russia.

Kaminskaya was married to Konstantin Simis and they had one son, Dimitri K. Simes. She died in Falls Church, Virginia.

Notes

1. ^ Yuly Kim. Advocat's wals. (in Russian) Ю.Ким. Адвокатский вальс
2. ^ Dina Kaminskaya, "Final Judgment: My Life as a Soviet Defense Attorney", Michigan Law Review, Vol. 82, No. 4, 1984
3. ^ "ЗВЕЗДЫ АДВОКАТУРЫ", Ежедневные НОВОСТИ (newspaper), Владивосток (in Russian)

References

• Joe Holley. "Dina Kaminskaya; Lawyer Defended Soviet Dissidents", Washington Post, Saturday, July 15, 2006; Page B06; Commentary
• Patricia Blake, "Verdict on Soviet Justice", May 02, 1983. Reprinted by Time, May 17, 1983.
• Moscow Helsinki Group, Public Group of the Assistance of the Implementation of Helsinki Accords in the USSR, Moscow Group “Helsinki”
• Giganty i Charodei Slova. Russkie Sudebnye Oratory Vtoroi Poloviny XIX. Nachala XX Veka by V. I. Smolyarchuk
• Felix Corley, "Dina Kaminskaya, Lawyer to Soviet dissidents" (obituary), The Independent, August 3, 2006

Persondata
Name	Kaminskaya, Dina
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	13 January 1919
Place of birth
Date of death	7 July 2006
Place of death