The court leaves. Sit!

On May 31, the court sentenced Mikhail Khodorkovsky to 9 years in prison in a general regime colony. Platon Lebedev - to 9 years in prison in a general regime colony. Andrei Krainov was sentenced to 5 years of suspended imprisonment. Until the verdict comes into force, Khodorkovsky and Lebedev will remain in Matrosskaya Silence.

Today, on the twelfth day of announcing the verdict, the court continued to analyze the defense evidence. The court called all the lawyers' arguments far-fetched and unfounded. In particular, when analyzing the searches in Zhukovka, in the premises of State Duma deputy Dubov, Irina Kolesnikova first conscientiously read out the arguments of the lawyers, who listed the numerous violations of the Code of Criminal Procedure committed by the investigators. In refutation, the judge only stated that the court does not take these defense arguments into account, since “they are far-fetched, unfounded, and do not correspond to reality.” This speech caused loud laughter in the hall, and Kolesnikova stated that next time she would take out the troublemakers, the press center of Mikhail Khodorkovsky reports.

As a result, the court found that the ex-head of YUKOS committed 9 crimes under 6 articles of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, and the head of MFO MENATEP Patgon Lebedev, in the opinion of the court, committed eight crimes, also provided for by 6 articles of the Criminal Code. Former general director of AOZT Volna Andrei Krainov, who is under recognizance not to leave the place, received a suspended sentence of 5 years. The court found his guilt of fraudulent misappropriation of 22 billion 800 million non-denominated rubles proven. The court released Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Platon Lebedev and Andrei Krainov on an episode related to the theft of shares of Apatit OJSC - after the expiration of the 10-year statute of limitations. Khodorkovsky and Lebedev did not admit their guilt.

There was no doubt that the verdict would be guilty: the text of the verdict almost completely repeated the text of the indictment. The main question was how severe the punishment would be. As it turned out, it is not too different from the state prosecutor’s demand to sentence Khodorkovsky and Lebedev to 10 years in prison, and Krainov to 5.5 years probation. So the Prosecutor General's Office was pleased with the verdict.

In the near future, the Prosecutor General's Office will bring new charges against Khodorkovsky and Lebedev. On May 14, official representative of the Prosecutor General's Office Natalia Vishnyakova said that we are talking about charges of money laundering, which amount to billions of dollars. Lawyers knew that such charges could be brought back in mid-January. Today Vishnyakova confirmed this. When asked by journalists when exactly Khodorkovsky and Lebedev might be charged, and also what punishment the ex-head of YUKOS and the head of the Menatepa MFO might face, Vishnyakova said: “Charges will be brought in the near future, their essence will be formulated in the resolution on filing charges ".

The trial in the "YUKOS case" lasted several months. The announcement of the verdict in the Meshchansky Court began on May 16. Moreover, it was originally planned that the verdict would begin to be read on May 27, but for unclear reasons the announcement was postponed. And when they did start reading the verdict, they did it extremely slowly; the announcement took 12 working days. Lawyers are already tired of making predictions about the date of the final verdict. Everyone agrees that the delay in reading the verdict was not accidental and is aimed at making the public lose interest in the case.

Lebedev has been in custody since July 2003, Khodorkovsky since October of the same year. Krainov was given a recognizance not to leave as a preventive measure - he cooperated with the investigation and partially admitted his guilt.

Well-known economist Mikhail Delyagin told a Polit.ru correspondent that after the verdict was announced, the judge, in accordance with the procedure, asked the defendants whether the verdict was clear. “What you can’t understand here is that this is the greatest monument to Basmanny justice,” Khodorkovsky replied. Lebedev said that he did not understand anything - Delyagin noted that the legal meaning of the sentence was indeed not entirely clear. In his impression, both convicts were expecting a more lenient sentence.

Delyagin also noted that the court's decision would have dire consequences for the economy, since now businessmen will understand that it is futile to get involved with such a state.

“This is an attempt to destroy people,” Khodorkovsky’s Canadian lawyer Robert Amsterdam told reporters, commenting on today’s verdict.

“Everyone who has worked with MBKh over the past years, creating the most successful and internationally recognized Russian company, retains a sense of enormous pride in his and their achievements. Our joint merit is the introduction of a progressive business, social and corporate culture to Russia, which made absolutely special work at YUKOS and working with Mikhail Khodorkovsky personally,” the YUKOS employees said in a statement. “For the vast majority of people, this verdict is a tragic example of the authorities using the law enforcement and judicial systems for political purposes,” they say. Company employees regard the verdict as a monstrous perversion of justice committed by the judicial system. This system not only readily carried out the order to destroy Mikhail Khodorkovsky, but, it seems, intends to destroy the YUKOS company itself.

Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Constitutional Legislation Pavel Krasheninnikov called the verdict of the Meshchansky Court quite harsh. He noted that such terms are given for serious and especially serious crimes.

“Unfortunately, such a verdict was expected. The state decided in advance that he should be convicted - this is not a legal, but a political decision,” Oleg Orlov, head of the Memorial human rights center, told Interfax.

Liberal politicians unanimously speak about the injustice of the verdict and note that Khodorkovsky’s actions for which he was convicted were common practice in the 90s. Independent State Duma deputy Vladimir Ryzhkov says that “nine years of imprisonment for Khodorkovsky is exactly nine years of economic reforms that took place from 1991 to 2000.” “Everything that is now recognized as criminal, in these years, according to the legislation in force at that time, was a completely common practice, which was practiced by hundreds of thousands of entrepreneurs and businessmen,” Ryzhkov noted.

“The cruel and blatantly unfair verdict in the Khodorkovsky case has once again shown that in Russia there is no independent court, in Russia there is only the all-powerful General Prosecutor’s Office, which serves the interests of the “new oligarchs” from the authorities who have decided to improve their well-being through the redistribution of property,” the statement says. today's statement by Irina Khakamada, received by Polit.ru.

Even the leader of the Rodina faction, Dmitry Rogozin, was surprised: “I thought that Khodorkovsky would be given much less,” he said. At the same time, according to him, now such processes in Russia will end, since the authorities are not going to do anything with regard to “the rest of the people who deceived the state and evaded large taxes.” In this regard, the parliamentarian emphasized, “oligarchs close to power can sleep peacefully.” As for the future prospects of the case, as Rogozin noted, of course, the lawyers will appeal today’s decision in the higher courts. However, “the fact remains that Khodorkovsky was chosen as a scapegoat,” concluded the Rodina leader. Let us note that the presidential administration does not deny that the “YUKOS case” is indicative.

Sociologist Olga Kryshtanovskaya, leaving the Meshchansky courtroom, told a Polit.ru correspondent that her friends in the Kremlin told the court back in January about the orientation given to the court - to sentence Khodorkovsky and Lebedev to a term of 8 to 10 years. The court thus chose the middle option. According to Kryshtanovskaya, there is hope for parole, but not before the results of the 2007-2008 elections become known.

Commenting on the situation near the court, she said that this is where the mechanism for the authorities to counter a possible revolution is being worked out. In particular, many policemen have been gathered and are very determined (despite the fact that the picket of Khodorkovsky supporters, as expected, ended at 15:00), tractors and trucks are parked near the building. As for the development of events, according to Kryshtanovskaya, there will be no velvet revolutions in Russia - if unrest begins, then “it will be more like Uzbekistan.”