The Constitutional Court considered criminal liability for violations at rallies constitutional

The Constitutional Court of Russia has recognized the legal application of criminal liability for violating the rules of holding rallies. Interfax is about this.

writes The court recognized that criminal liability for violating the rules of holding rallies is consistent with the Constitution if it is used to protect the rights of citizens. The Constitutional Court also recognized legal criminal liability for three violations of the rules for holding rallies within 180 days.

Criminal liability for violating the order of organizing or holding meetings, rallies, demonstrations, processions or picketing can be recognized as meeting the requirements of the Constitution only if it is necessary to protect the rights and freedoms of man and citizen, other constitutionally recognized values ​​and is adequate to the public danger of the criminalized illegal act, signs which are clearly and clearly defined in the criminal law, excluding repeated prosecution and conviction of a person for the same crime,

- says the decision of the Constitutional Court.

Activist Ildar Dadin filed a complaint against Article 212.1 of the Criminal Code in September 2016. In the complaint, Dadin notes that the article violates his right not to be convicted twice for the same offense. It is understood that activists convicted under this article must first suffer administrative punishment and then criminal punishment for the same offense. The activist’s guilt, therefore, consists of repeated offenses, which is contrary to the Constitution, Dadin emphasizes.

The activist himself was not present at the hearing, as the court rejected the defense’s request for his participation in the process.

During the court's consideration of Dadin's complaint, the government's plenipotentiary representative to the Constitutional Court, Mikhail Barshchevsky, criticized the rule, but emphasized that it does not violate the Constitution. Representatives of the President and the State Duma at the trial considered the norm to comply with the Constitution.

In their response to the article, the Prosecutor General’s Office and experts from the Far Eastern University (FEFU) agreed with Dadin’s position and noted the need to change the legislation on rallies. Repeated commission of an offense cannot become a condition for “increasing the degree of danger of such actions,” the conclusion says. It was also noted that the same offense cannot be subject to both administrative and criminal liability.

The article on multiple violations at rallies was introduced in 2014. It implies criminal liability for those who have violated the rules of holding rallies two or more times in six months. Ildar Dadin became the first person convicted under this article and was sentenced to two and a half years in prison.