New accused

It is currently known that Strongina was detained in St. Petersburg early in the morning while visiting friends, then her parents’ apartment was searched, and she herself was taken for questioning to the local branch of the Center for Combating Extremism. According to Deputy of the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg Maxim Reznik, the arrest was carried out by investigators who arrived from Moscow.

According to Slon. Ru,” during the interrogation, Strongina was charged with participating in mass riots (Part 2 of Article 212 of the Criminal Code) and was shown a video recording from Bolotnaya Square in which she allegedly throws a plastic bottle. After this, as Interfax reports, Strongina partially admitted her guilt and was released on her own recognizance.

In connection with the detention of Strongina, St. Petersburg human rights activist Dinar Idrisov recommends that those against whom investigative actions may still be carried out in connection with the Bolotnaya case, refrain from communicating until a lawyer enters the case, referring to the 51st Constitution: “Practice „ swamp case" shows that the guys started to say something , wanting to protect themselves, and as a result it turned against them."

According to the publication “Slon. Ru”, During the interrogation, Strongina was given the opportunity to write a petition for amnesty. Strongina can be amnestied, since she was charged only with participating in mass riots - currently, of the people with similar charges, only those who were also accused of using violence against a government official are on trial or sentenced (Article 318 of the Criminal Code) . Thus, the story with Strongina may turn out to be similar to the story with Dmitry Altaychinov, whose case was brought to court at the end of 2013 (despite the fact that until then there were no reports about him in connection with the Bolotnaya case): he fully admitted guilty of participating in mass riots, agreed to have the case examined in a special manner, after which he was granted amnesty. According to Sergei Vlasov, coordinator of the Rosuznik project, which is involved in helping those accused in the Bolotnaya case, there is a certain list of people who, according to the investigation, participated in the mass riots that allegedly took place on Bolotnaya, and it is necessary to take appropriate action against them , even if they then immediately fall under amnesty.

Currently, the investigation into the Bolotnaya case has been extended until June 6. According to Vlasov, at the beginning of the year there were rumors about a certain “third wave” of the “Bolotnaya case”, investigative actions for which would begin after the “Case of Four” (Alexey Gaskarov, Ilya Gushchin, Elena Kokhtareva, Alexander Margolin) went to court - by analogy with how the current defendants in the “Case of Four” began to be detained and interrogated after the “Case of Twelve” was separated into a separate proceeding. However, now there are no traces of this, other than the detention and interrogation of Polina Strongina.