Inedible Judge

(Photo: Pavel Gorshkov )

There is, of course, something reassuring in the fact that, while everything around is changing, with Sergei Pashin everything is as usual.

On January 18, the famous lawyer, deprived of his judicial powers in October last year, was reinstated as a judge for the second time.

Pashin, one of the main authors of all the fundamental (now safely buried) documents of judicial reform - from the concept of judicial reform to the so-called model criminal procedure code and the law on jury trials - could never take root anywhere. At one time, he was expelled from the State Legal Administration, where he was in charge of the legal reform itself. He became a judge of the Moscow City Court, but two and a half years ago the qualification board of judges deprived him of his powers, essentially for disloyalty to the then chairman of the court. Then it was restored by the Supreme Court panel.

For the second time, Pashin was persecuted for being too proactive: he was guilty of dictating his work phone number on the air of Echo of Moscow, as well as writing a scientific review of the decision of the Kaluga court that imprisoned a conscientious objector to military service. According to eyewitnesses, at a panel meeting closed to the press, one high-ranking judge said: “If he wants to protect human rights, let him become a human rights defender.”

Now the Higher Qualification Board has recognized that what Pashin was charged with is not a violation. No one, including Sergei Pashin himself, expected such an outcome. “They will devour,” Pashin predicted before the meeting. “Nothing has changed,” he complained after the hearing. “Nobody will pay me compensation.” Another would say thank you, but this one will never learn to be more accommodating. For this, of course, sooner or later he will be devoured. That is, nothing changes. He himself admits that he is already preparing for another dismissal.

Meanwhile, three months ago, when Sergei Pashin was fired, his cases in the Moscow City Court were stuck. One trial at that time had been going on for a year, during which witnesses and victims were collected throughout the former Soviet Union. No one will pay compensation to either them or the accused in custody.