Keep the "wheels"

The investigation in the case of the Kaliningrad journalist Igor Rudnikov is delayed. His newspaper "New Wheels" under pressure from the authorities is forced to stop release

On April 7, in Kaliningrad, the fourth rally was already held in defense of Rudnikov and the New Wheel newspapers, organized by deputies and regional branches of the Communist Party and Patriots of Russia. The case against Rudnikov was opened last fall on charges of extortion of 50 thousand dollars at the head of the Investigative Committee of the RF IC for the Kaliningrad Region Viktor Ledenev ( Novaya, No. 124 of November 8, 2017 ).

The fact of transferring money in a closed envelope through a newspaper employee in exchange for refusing to publish information about the luxurious cottage of the general, who have already been published, the accused considers a provocation. Its version is reinforced by the fact that Ledenev’s closest relatives in 2015 were involved in a similar, albeit less successful provocation in Novorossiysk, who had the goal of planting a neighbor who disputed the illegal construction of an apartment building ( News, No. 141 of December 18, 2017 ).

In addition to Rudnikov, as an intermediary, according to investigators, was participated by the well-known businessman in Kaliningrad and, in the past, the deputy representative of the president in the North-Western Federal District Alexander Datsyshin, placed under house arrest. In the first interrogations, he gave the readings convicting Rudnikov, but his role in the case looks strange, and the investigation on the not -so -most difficult episode was obviously prolonged. Now Rudnikov was temporarily transferred from the Lefortovo pre -trial detention center, where he was transferred in November, in the IVS in Petrovka - in Lefortovo there are no conditions for the timely participation of lawyers in investigative actions. According to our information, mines are afraid of directly illegal actions during the stages, since the criminal case may be a continuation of not only the history of Ledenev’s house, but also the topics of real estate he had previously raised in Svetlogorsk, because of which in 2016 an attack was committed, which almost cost Igor’s life (the case was not properly investigated, the customer, organizers and some computers remain in freedom ( "New", No. 65 of June 21, 2017 )

Meanwhile, on April 4, the acting editor-in-chief of the “New Wheel” Yuri Grozhni announced that the newspaper, published in Kaliningrad 23 years and popular among residents of the region ( “New”, No. 57 of May 31, 2017 ), ceases to exist because of the nit-handed nursery, refusal from commercial structures in the distribution of its printed version and seizure in the last months of the whole circulations.

The International Organization of Journalists “Reporters Without Borders” has just opposed the pressure on the “new wheels”. It plans to do the same this week, according to our information, the Union of Journalists of St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region. The “new” also joins these statements and offers to do the same to the Russian journalistic organizations that are still in the country.