The state then prosecuted the survivors. Fifty-nine people from a village of a few hundred were charged and thirty-eight were convicted — twenty-two men and sixteen women — to a total of thirty-six and a half years in prison; nobody was punished for the shooting. Hlinka began his own sentence on 30 November 1907 in the Star Prison at Szeged, where he spent the time translating the Old Testament into Slovak. Abroad the case would not die: the Norwegian writer Björnstjerne Bjørnson and the Scottish historian R. W. Seton-Watson took it up, and Černová was reported across Europe and America in the very year of the Apponyi school laws, which required every child in the kingdom to learn in Hungarian. Hlinka appealed to Rome, his suspension was lifted on 8 April 1909, and on 29 June 1910 he consecrated the church at Černová himself.Štát potom postavil pred súd preživších. Z dediny s pár stovkami obyvateľov obvinili päťdesiatdeväť ľudí, tridsaťosem odsúdili — dvadsaťdva mužov a šestnásť žien — spolu na tridsaťšesť a pol roka väzenia; za streľbu nepotrestali nikoho. Hlinka nastúpil svoj trest 30. novembra 1907 v szegedínskej Hviezdicovej väznici a čas tam strávil prekladom Starého zákona do slovenčiny. V zahraničí prípad nezomrel: ujali sa ho nórsky spisovateľ Björnstjerne Bjørnson a škótsky historik R. W. Seton-Watson a o Černovej písali noviny po celej Európe i v Amerike — a to práve v roku, keď Apponyiho školské zákony prikázali, aby sa každé dieťa v kráľovstve učilo po maďarsky. Hlinka sa odvolal do Ríma, suspendáciu mu zrušili 8. apríla 1909 a 29. júna 1910 kostol v Černovej vysvätil sám.
