Arrest of Alexei Sutuga: they promised to “imprison him anyway”

The Zamoskvoretsky District Court of Moscow arrested anti-fascist Alexei Sutuga until May 6 on charges of hooliganism. According to investigators, he participated as part of an unidentified group of people
in an attack on January 2 on 6 young people having lunch at the Sbarro cafe near the Oktyabrskaya metro station.

Three of the six are involved in the case as victims. According to Sutuga, they may be related to the ultra-right, and he himself broke up a fight between them and another group of young people.

Alexey was detained on Saturday evening by Center E operatives after an anti-fascist concert held in the Izmailovo area. According to the movement “For Human Rights”, in addition to Sutuga, more than 10 people were detained. The pretext was the commission of a certain crime by an unknown person in the area of ​​the concert, but, according to human rights activists, there were no grounds to suspect anti-fascists.

“The identity of the “law enforcement officers” who are illegally prosecuting citizens raises serious concerns. One of the detainees was approached on April 5, 2014 by a police officer who introduced himself as “Sergei” from the notorious Center “E”. “Sergei told the detainee about his far-right political views and personal hatred for everyone who does not share such views and fights against their manifestations,” the movement’s press release says .

“Sergei also demanded that the detainee enter into an agreement on secret cooperation, threatening otherwise to make public personal information about the young man, including his home address, so that people with ultra-right views could carry out physical violence against the citizen. Unfortunately, “Sergey” did not show his official identification; the only signs we can point out are light hair color and a small beard; “Sergey” has a habit of dressing in the Thor Steinar brand, which is fashionable among the far right, human rights activists note.

All the detainees were soon released, and a report was drawn up against Alexey for petty hooliganism, which gave reason to leave him in the police department.

“The detention of Alexey Sutuga took place in an even more flagrant violation of Russian legislation. Unknown people drove up to him in a car without signs of belonging to law enforcement agencies and did not introduce themselves as required by Art. 5 of the Federal Law “On Police Order”, they did not show their official identification, they did not give the reasons for the arrest. What happened was essentially a kidnapping,” notes the Human Rights Movement.

During the arrest, operatives questioned Sutuga about his winter trip to the Maidan. He was charged with a felony on Sunday evening.

Alexey Sutuga first found himself in a pre-trial detention center in April 2012: then he was accused of two brawls with nationalists near the Moscow music club “Vozdukh” in December 2011. Allegedly, on December 4, Alexey, as part of an antifa group, attacked a group of young nationalists, as a result of which one of the nationalists was stabbed. And on December 17, 2011 - already at an anti-fascist concert - Sutuga allegedly participated in the beating of security guards who, according to antifa, were far-right football fans.

Sutuga spent more than a year in pre-trial detention. The investigation admitted that Alexey had nothing to do with the December 4 episode - he was not at the scene of the incident. Alexey did not deny that he was at the Vozdukh club on December 17, but he denied participating in the beating of the guards. The case was dropped due to an amnesty in January 2014, and in the summer of 2013 Sutuga was released from pre-trial detention center on bail.

In the eyes of Center “E” employees, Sutuga is “one of the leaders of antifa and anarchists.” Almost simultaneously with the first arrest of Alexei, this conspiracy text was published . In him
Sutuga is presented as part of a leftist conspiracy in which a variety of figures are involved - from politicians Oleg Shein and Ilya Ponomarev to anonymous groups of anarchist arsonists , as well as the Dozhd TV channel. appeared Later, information about the connections of Andrei Gulyutin, the then editor-in-chief of the Modus Agendi website, which published this text, with the E Center. (Gulyutin is the ex-administrator of the website of the Young Guard of United Russia, the current deputy editor-in-chief of the Reedus Internet channel ).

In February 2014, Sutuga was mentioned in a Lifenews article as a “left-wing radical” who “actively participated in Euromaidan” (the article also stated that Sutuga was convicted of hooliganism).

Aleksei’s comrades say in his own words that in 2012, operatives from Center “E” came to him in the pre-trial detention center and promised to “put him in jail anyway,” even if the court acquitted him in the Vozdukha case.