Jehovah’s Witness Sean Pike, a Guyanese and Russian citizen, is free after five years in prison for his faith

On 2 October 2026, Sean Pike walked out of Penal Colony No. 9 in Russia’s Novgorod Oblast, having served his sentence in full.

According to investigators, he and other Jehovah’s Witnesses gathered at a home in Moscow to pray, read the Bible and drink tea together. For that, he was charged with ‘organising the activities of an extremist organisation’. He was arrested in August 2021 and sentenced to seven years in December 2023.

Most of his time was spent in pre-trial detention, where he caught Covid-19 and developed hypertension. He also faced racial discrimination and, at first, had to sleep on the floor of his cell.

Through it all, he kept caring for his wife and their two teenage daughters, one of whom has a disability. He supported them during visits and wrote each of them personal letters. Friends sent parcels and attended his court hearings.

Sean Pike says he now sees those years as a kind of course. ‘I call it ‘Know Yourself and the Father’,’ he said. ‘I saw that God cares for us in advance and was always with me.’

On his release, he said: ‘I’m very happy. It’s a feeling like no other.’

Now, he is back with his family.