Teacher on trial for telling stories about fraud

In St. Petersburg, a trial began against teacher of Russian language and literature Tatyana Ivanova, who spoke in January about fraud in the parliamentary elections . The person involved in her story accused Ivanova of libel and demands 100,000 rubles. A variety of people, strangers to her, came to court to support the teacher.

Story. In January, T. Ivanova, the chairman of one of the precinct election commissions and the former head teacher of school No. 575, told Novaya Gazeta about fraud in the elections in St. Petersburg. She named the participants who tried to persuade her to break the law and rig the ballots in favor of United Russia. Among them is the head of the district’s education department, Natalya Nazarova, who filed a lawsuit against the editors of Novaya Gazeta, journalist Lyudmila Rybina and Tatyana Ivanova. N. Nazarova hopes to sue 100,000 rubles for damaging her business reputation.

On May 16, Tatyana Ivanova was the first to attend her own trial at the Vasileostrovsky District Court. To the question “Will they come to support you?” She timidly replied: “I don’t know, but I would really like to.”

Still, a variety of people came to support the teacher. Among them were well-known representatives of the opposition - the head of the St. Petersburg branch of the United Front, Olga Kurnosova and Grigory Yavlinsky, participants in the “peaceful protest in St. Petersburg on Isaakievskaya” and young girls with white ribbons on their chests. In total, about 40 people gathered.

Not everyone was allowed into the courtroom. Tatyana Ivanova entered the hall with a bouquet of flowers, which Grigory Yavlinsky handed to her with the words: “You are an example for all teachers.”

The hearing began with the consideration of motions from the defense and prosecution parties and lasted 3.5 hours. The plaintiff Natalya Nazarova does not personally participate in the process; two of her representatives are present by proxy, who put forward the main complaints about the article, which, in their opinion, contains phrases that discredit Nazarova’s dignity and give a negative characterization. Some of the lawyers' statements - for example, that "Nazarova did not say, did or declare anything there" - caused laughter among visitors in the courtroom, and tricky questions flew from the seats: "Why was she needed there at all?" The co-defendants tried to understand the logic of the “accusation”; due to unclear wording in the text (the article mentioned not only N. Nazarova, but also member of the city election commission S. Ponomarev), the parties spent a good half of the meeting clarifying the principles of work of journalists and editors of printed publications.

A witness on Ivanova’s behalf, former teacher Antonina Kovaleva, spoke at the trial. She worked during the elections in the same building together with Tatyana Ivanova and was an eyewitness to the events that Novaya Gazeta reported on. Under a judicial oath, she confirmed N. Nazarova’s direct participation in the falsification of election results at polling station No. 99.

The court hearing ended with the rejection of the co-defendants’ petition “to order a linguistic examination” and the acceptance of the plaintiff’s petition “to attract a witness,” whose name was not made public. In this regard, the next meeting will be held on June 1, 2012 at 15:00.

Tatyana Ivanova herself is not discouraged, she says that she does not regret her action, and relies on the opinion of people who have already made their conclusions - they are not in favor of education officials.