The Russian state and its authorized representative, the Prosecutor General's Office, have shown that it turns out that you can do business with them. Or, more precisely, you don't have to do business with them. For example, the criminal case against Yevgeny Chichvarkin has been closed. Now the founder of Euroset is expected to return home from London, where he hid from prosecution for over two years.

Back in September 2008, when the case was first opened (initially against Chichvarkin's former subordinates), its far-fetched nature was quite obvious. I don't know, maybe the security service employees treated this Vlaskin (a forwarder who delivered phones for Euroset and once disappeared with the goods) badly. But two things were immediately obvious. Firstly, Vlaskin complained to the police five years after his "abduction" by Euroset security officers. Five years!!! And secondly, the case was opened precisely at the time when Chichvarkin was actively negotiating the sale of Euroset. This is not evidence of the innocence of Euroset employees and Chichvarkin, I understand. But such coincidences do not happen.

Two years later, former Euroset employees, who were accused of several criminal charges at once, were fully acquitted. The jury acquitted them, and the Prosecutor General's Office did not appeal the acquittal. As a result, the Chichvarkin case also had to be closed as a direct result of the Euroset case. It all seemed logical, but something was wrong.

Do you know many examples of our Russian prosecutor's office so easily admitting defeat? Not clinging, not frantically looking for new evidence of guilt, but just like that - meekly stepping aside? This is not its style. And there is something scary about this behavior that is not typical for it.

Or maybe this is a tactical retreat, which will be followed by "case number two". On what grounds - I have no idea. But the investigators have a great imagination, they will come up with something. The main thing is to believe that this particular person is a thief, and that he "should be in prison".

Or maybe this is some kind of political demonstration of Justice and Principles. And for some reason it seems to me that this is it.

At the end of December, the prosecutor's office celebrated a big victory - the court found Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Platon Lebedev guilty of almost all articles of the second criminal case (for stealing oil from themselves) and sentenced them to 14 years in prison. The time of the verdict - New Year's Eve - was undoubtedly chosen deliberately. However, the calculation failed and the atmosphere in society was instantly electrified to the limit. There was an urgent need for relaxation, and here was the opportunity - the story with Chichvarkin. Chichvarkin - he is so popular, so charismatic, so unpredictable, and on top of all that, he was sentenced unfairly. It was unfair, right? Well, that's the end of it. In the literal sense of the word.

If it really is about politics, then Chichvarkin can come back. The prosecutor's office won't lay a finger on him now. He is an emblem, a symbol of the Triumph of Law and Order. True, he has plenty of ill-wishers here too, mainly at the "personnel" level, so at least a couple of guards will come in handy (if Evgeny is going to come back at all, and that is not a fact at all).

But I can't shake the feeling of being deceived. I don't understand how the correction of one injustice can atone for another. And no matter how sympathetic you are to Chichvarkin and his situation, the scale of this story will never compare to the scale of the destruction of YUKOS and the persecution of its owners. London is not a penal colony in Chita. And Euroset is not YUKOS.

Justice in a Human Mask: Chichvarkin Returns