Ten thousand for the guitar

The other day, the Tver District Court of Moscow represented by judges Alesi Orekhova sentenced a fine of 10 thousand rubles of a street musician. Sergey “Diamond” Khavsky, who played on July 10 on the guitar in the middle of Nikolskaya Street, was found guilty under Article 20.2.2 - this article was introduced into the Code of Administrative Offenses in June 2012 as part of the infamous law that tightened the rules for mass events. According to this article, they are attracted to “the organization of mass simultaneous stay and (or) the movement of citizens in public places that have entailed a violation of public order”. To this formulation, any cluster of people who are not a rally, a picket, demonstration or a procession can fall from “runs” and “occupation” organized by opposition activists, to some exotic celebrations, which for some reason will show the police suspicious. The musician was convicted that, having organized this most massive stay, he interfered with the movement of pedestrians and the access of citizens to nearby stores. The OVD-Info publishes the story of Sergei Khavsky, who claims that there was not only any “mass stay” next to him, but he himself was not even near the house that was mentioned in the court decision.

Both I, and other musicians-we play in different places in Moscow, and in nine cases out of ten, the police pass or pass by and do not say anything-maybe they have no order to say something and somehow act or simply uninteresting, they have other things. In one of the ten cases, they begin to make complaints: “You can’t play here, go away,” or even more strictly: “Now we will take you if you don’t leave here in five minutes.” On July 10, I was taken for the first time in my life, although I have been playing for five years on the streets (I had not had a single drive before). In fact, there were only positive reviews about my work, I am a professional musician, I play good music in the style of jazz, country blues, rock and roll.

Now in Moscow there are a lot of musicians in the summer, and for myself I realized that in order to earn at least something for a living, we must come to play outside in the morning. On July 10, I first arrived somewhere by noon on the Kuznetsk bridge, played there for about half an hour, it was more or less good, they started to come some little money. But then there the guys who collect charitable contributions for sick children stood there nearby, they spoke to MegaFon, interrupted music. I went to look for further a place and as a result came to Nikolskaya Street.

At first, somewhere in the beginning of the fourth, I played in the middle of Nikolskaya, between Lubyanka and Red Square. Then the guard came out, who works at the university located there, and the university, as it turned out, works in the summer-the correspondence men come, someone else, classes are underway. He asked me to move, of course, I agreed, since it was necessary. I moved closer to Red Square, to where the famous passage to the theater metro station. It is very crowded, lively, I liked playing there, there is more opportunity to earn and be heard. There were no objections from anyone, except that the guards who control the pedestrian streets came up, said that you could play at all, but asked to move the cover closer so as not to occupy an extra place on the street, and immediately hide the money so that they would not lie in the case. Of course, I agreed. We talked normally. Apparently, they liked what I play.

So everything went on until the beginning of the sixth, until about 17:15, as in the court decision it was written when a police car appeared and two policemen appeared very hard, categorically said: “So, the concert ends, load the equipment in the car and went with us!” I say: “Well, why do you need to mess around? If you can’t play, I will gather and go home. Why do you need to spend time, I am too? " “No, no conversation, let's go.” There is nothing to do, I had to go.

They brought me to the on-duty part of the China-Gorod police department. They didn’t give me any explanations for a long time, I had to spend it there about three and a half hours there, while they were fiddling with some other things. Once the duty officer came to me and asked if people gathered around me while I was playing, whether there were listeners in the number of ten people. I replied that there was no one. The fact is that I play instrumental music, and people are not going to such music with us. Among the summer in the daytime, people are not going even on those who sing something that is in demand for most walking. Usually just passes by, someone will put a coin or bill, and that’s all. Graduates are very rare, in the evening, in all special places, but definitely not on Nikolskaya Street. Some slapping guys only approached me once, tried to dance, asked to hold on to the guitar, but I immediately asked them: “Guys, distance me from me, please because I will be driven out of here because of you now.” I already know from experience that such gatherings do not help, but only strongly interfere and set up all the services that work nearby against me. And they immediately left, they were about fifteen seconds, and there were three or four people. And just at that time, the police passed me and did not say a word. I thought that everything was fine, and continued to play. The duty officer also asked if I had an amplifier. I replied that yes, because I play an electric guitar, and this is a tool that does not sound at all without a call.

Then the duty officer finally called me and began to explain in such a guilty, apologizing tone: “I understand everything, the musicians do not annoy me, I like it when someone is playing on the street or in the train, it's all good ... But you know, you got into this story: we were called some vigilant citizen, and since there was a call, you need to make anything about the administrative case.” And he began to write something. He says: "You have to come to the court." It turned out that, from the words of this citizen, I gathered around me a crowd of listeners in the amount of ten or more people, used sound -integrating devices, and interfered with the passage of citizens.

The attendant himself told me that I can write a refutation on the other side of the protocol. I did so, wrote that there were no ten listeners and absolutely did not interfere with the movement of pedestrians, because it was located very compactly and the guitar cover lay next to me. If someone told me that I was interfering, I would naturally take it into account and made it so as not to interfere. This vigilant citizen, unfortunately, did not tell me anything, but preferred to call the police and say a lot of excess, which, in fact, was not. He says: “There will be a court to decide, there is nothing to be done, there will be some minimum fine, the courts in general are trying not to deal with such cases, because this is not a simple offense. Well, you go somehow. And the guitar will have to pick up from you before the trial. ” Well, what to argue with him? He says: “Take everything, cords, everything that you have for a guitar there, and the guitar with the cover is still in time for us.” It remains only to agree. I go out of the department, and, as I understand it, the head of this institution goes to meet me and says: “But what, I forgot the guitar, or what?” “Yes, they don’t give the guitar to me.” “Come on, they will give it right now.” He entered there, said something to someone-they brought the guitar. “Here you have a guitar,” says the boss, “do not forget to come to the court, and so that I don’t see you on Nikolskaya Street!” Well, you can’t do so that I, conflict with them, or what?

I began to find out how to behave in court, what to talk about. The only thing I found is advertising on the Internet of free lawyers consultations. I went to them, but they, as I understand it, were absolutely not in the subject of such a situation, apparently, they never encountered similar issues. The only thing they advised me to try to put pressure on pity. They offered me to take their employee with me, who will say everything for me in court, the price of the issue is 21 thousand rubles. I thought the price is too large. By the way, the head of the department told me: "Well, you think, you will pay two and a half thousand." I still thought that it was somehow a bit too much for such nonsense history. Well, I decided that I did not need to contact an employee of this law office - I will pay two and a half thousand in an extreme case, or maybe they will decide that the first time you can forgive.

I went to court. There was an interesting story. I came to the office, they told me that the Judge Orekhova was taking on the second floor, I went there, I give the agenda, there is a big line on various issues. At first they were at a loss: it turns out that they have some other people in different matters are recorded for this time. Then they began to rummage in the base and said: "Wait, we will call you now too." I waited for half an hour or forty minutes, then they called me. I do not know how the courts should be carried out under today's norms, but I was surprised that in court there were neither those who were pressed on me, nor the police who delivered me to the department. But in the decision it was written that, from the words of the policemen who delayed me, I gathered the audience and there is no reason not to trust them. And I can definitely say that when they approached me on the street, there was no one next to me at all. Even no one was indignant - "Why are you taking a musician that he did this?" People were at a distance of ten, twenty, thirty meters, just went about their business. Nobody gave me the final word, they just asked what was there very dryly, the judge pulled me several times when I tried to enter the course of the matter more widely, she said: “We are not interested, say only what was - the place, time, what happened when you came for you.” I told, she left, thought something for a long time, then went out and announced the verdict-10 thousand rubles to pay for 60 days.

The decree says that I was near the house 4 on Nikolskaya Street. This is documentary inaccuracy. House 4 is the next house behind the GUM. And I, in fact, was at the level of house 6/2 building 1 or even 6/2 building 6, before Epiphany Lane. They greatly distorted it, the distance between the house 4 and the place where I was, 50 meters visually. Unfortunately, I can’t say whether it was the same in the protocol, I now need to go to photograph this protocol, because they didn’t give me a copy in the department, they only issued a summons to the court.