The prosecutor's office returned for further investigation the case of inciting hatred against employees of the Center for Special Exclusion Centers

The prosecutor's office of the Central District of St. Petersburg returned the case of the nationalist Dina Garina to the Investigative Committee to eliminate violations and conduct an additional investigation. This was reported to OVD-Info by the lawyer of the International Human Rights Group "Agora" Vitaly Cherkasov.

The activist is accused of inciting hatred or enmity on the basis of belonging to the social group “employees of the Center for Combating Extremism” (under Part 1 of Article 282 of the Criminal Code).

Cherkasov said that the prosecutor simultaneously received the criminal case from the investigator and the written arguments of the defense. They state that, based on judicial practice, police officers cannot be recognized as a social group. The lawyer believes that the arguments were taken into account, and instead of transferring the case to the court, the prosecutor decided to return it to the investigator.

At the end of July, Cherkasov wrote on Facebook that the investigator had violated the provisions of Part 1 of Art. 198 Code of Criminal Procedure the right of the accused and the defense counsel. He familiarized the lawyer and Garina with the decision to appoint an examination when the expert opinion itself was already ready. Hiding this fact, the investigator accepted a petition from Cherkasov, in which the defender asked to replace the expert institution. After drawing attention to this point, the prosecutor did not see a violation of the rights of Garina and Cherkasov.

On February 1, the Dzerzhinsky District Court of St. Petersburg returned Garina's criminal case to the Tsentralny District Prosecutor's Office to eliminate the violations.

The case was initiated in connection with the speech of the activist at a rally in March 2015, during which Garina spoke negatively about the work of the employees of the Center for Combating Extremism.

The Investigative Committee for St. Petersburg refused to open a case against the activist five times, refusing to consider the CPE employees a separate social group. Finally, on the sixth attempt, the case was nevertheless initiated, and the examinations conducted at the initiative of the defense were not attached to the case. In the examinations of the investigation, the experts, among other things, were asked questions about the presence in Garina's speech of signs of incitement to hatred, although according to the law only a court can answer this.

In March 2016, the activist was already convicted under part 1 of article 282 and part 2 of article 280 of the Criminal Code (public calls for extremist activity) for publications on social networks.