“The girl I am persistent and vengeful. And these citizens have a pure form "

Interview with human rights activist Olga Romanova. She left Russia after the deputy head of the FSIN accused her of theft

On November 7, the head of the Rus Sitting project, Olga Romanova, said that since the summer of 2017 he does not live in Russia, fearing criminal prosecution. According to her, she left for Germany after the deputy chief of the Federal Penitentiary Service of the Russian Federation Anatoly Rudy wrote a statement to her: he accused Romanov of assigning the money that the World Bank issued to her to conduct lectures on financial literacy in prisons. In the summer, searches were held in the office of Rus Sitting. The lawyers of the organization through the arbitration court have already proved that the organization has given even more lectures than was required. Now Romanova through the court requires the Federal Penitentiary Service to abandon claims. She does not exclude that she will seek a criminal case against Rudoy for a false denunciation. "Medusa" asked Romanov to tell the details of the conflict with the FSIN.

-Are you now in Germany, as you wrote in a post, or in France, where do you upload photos from?

- In Germany. And in France I have a large program with French FSIN; From Monday it will be the same with German.

- As part of the work in the [unnamed] German fund, which you mentioned on Facebook post?

- No, in the framework of the work of “Rus' sitting”, and in the fund - such, freelancer work.

- How do you like French prisons?

-In different ways, where how. I am surprised by both good and bad things, although about the latter I am not yet ready to reason how bad they are. For example, in any French prison - except for female - there are “roads” . We go with the boss and with the main guard on the inner LALL [that is, along the colony], and the ropes from one chamber to another descend before our eyes. Okay, I see - but then the boss. And he looks into the sky, pretends that he sees nothing. We carefully asked him, and he: "What are you, they are passing the notes to each other." This, of course, is good, but there with notes - phones and drugs. There are much more in prisons - I can’t say another word - *************** [gouging] than ours. But without sadism. This: I don’t touch you, I allow a lot of things to be illegal, and you don’t touch me, sit well, and they will give me a bonus. But for the fact that drugs go there, the jailer must definitely burn in hell.

- You left after the deputy director of the FSIN Anatoly Rudy wrote a statement to you. Are you familiar with Rudy?

- No, I never met. I am not very familiar with these people at all.

- The statement was written in March, did you immediately learn about it?

- No, I found out at the time of searches when I looked at the pieces of paper [with whom investigators came]. The search was June 8 (Romanova said in the post : “In early June, searches were held in the“ Rus of Sitting ” - in the office and in accounting” - approx. “Medusa” ), I immediately left - to deal with such things at a safe distance. I advise everyone to understand first, and then you can return.

- You decided to leave immediately after the searches?

- This is not "decided", you see. Causes - pier. There is no time [think], the reaction is automatic, I have been doing this for ten years.

“But you only had a visa - at least you wrote so.”

- A visa - and that’s it, yes. I went to Paris, lived for some time with my lawyer, then went to my friends to Italy. Then she lived with friends in Paris for a month. All this time I thought what to do if I did not have time to solve problems until the end of the 90-day period of stay [in Europe], and worked a lot with lawyers and lawyers on my case. We have prepared a lot, so this week I went on the attack. I rated the defense structures, the state of long -range artillery and, in fact, is the time. It’s time to transplant them all completely, and then, you know, it’s a shame: over the summer, while I am here, 90% of the people who wrote me swallows transplanted without me. It's a shame. I did not have a hand.

-That is, anyone else wrote a statement to you besides Rudogo? Who do you mean?

- I have a conflict with FSIN for ten years. The bosses are changing, the composition, but from the beginning of my activity, when only my husband was imprisoned , I still have two unprecedented people. Those who then worked in the FSIN, including the [former chief of Alexander] Reimer, are all sitting. Two remained: the former chief of the Butyrki [Dmitry] Komnov and General of the Stavropol FSIN [Vladislav] Nikishin, I had the right to the right time. And then in life [someone fell into the list]; I made efforts to some [to put them up]. Now Rudy remained on the list.

- Well, in this case, you can make efforts - in the court that will take place in your lawsuit against the FSIN.

- Yes, I want to speak in court, of course; The consideration of the case was scheduled for December 6 ( in the post , Romanova warned that she would not return to this day to Russia, because “there was no less danger” - approx. “Medusa” ). The whole story is this: in 2013, we subscribed to work on a contract (this was not a grant - we still did not have them at all) with the World Bank. Work for two years, the World Bank paid money, they passed through the Ministry of Finance. Since the charity fund [the assistance to convicts and their families, known by the name of its main project as “Sitting Rus'”] cannot do work under the contract, I transferred this case to my ERES LLC (“Sitting Rus'” is deciphered). It is engaged in various contracts in contracts: for example, we conduct sociological research, and did the “Levada Center” by order of nationalism in prisons. From ERES LLC pays for experts, survey participants, and I, as the founder, put the founder at the account of “Rus Sitting” - it is easy to check all this. So the organization earns, although this is a small share. After the World Bank, we did not have arrived at all, in two years - three hundred thousand. We do a lot of work and understand that [so that there are no complaints to us] we must not just put a piece of paper to a piece of paper, but also - so that there are videos, audio and honorary letters.

Under an agreement with the World Bank, we had to study that the prisoners of finances did not know. First, they conducted deep research - for alimony, pensions, for payment for an apartment from prison. They collected questions, [in total] about 500. The favorite question was from the female zone in Chelyabinsk: “I am sitting for killing my husband, I killed him because he took a loan. Do I need to give a loan now? " Without jokes, human tragedy is also that yes, it is necessary.

Then they gave lectures, three species - to relatives, convicts and FSIN employees. Under the contract there were 30, 30 and 30. And we read 34, 60 and 92; Could not stop. Five types of brochures were released, the FSIN then also asked to make a squeeze on one sheet so that it could be hung on the stand. We, of course, keep correspondence [with them]. We expected something to be.

- So you expected a statement to you?

-Kona-ethnic! Always. Lectures were lectured by the PMC [public observation commission], people from the Orthodox dioceses, was one Commissioner for the Rights of the Child. We did not pay for the work if they did not provide audio, video or certificate from the head of the institution that there was a lecture. Everything is filed with us. Then we calmly reported to the World Bank. Then Rudy suddenly found out that there was such a job, and wrote a denunciation - supposedly nothing was done. We shrugged and, while I was gone, filed a lawsuit against an arbitration to the World Bank operator: "Guys, we exceeded the work, please pay us the difference." Pretty arrogant lawsuit, but, I'm sorry, what to do?

- Cute move.

- Well, of course! The project operators understood everything perfectly, their court attracted as a third party, we were happy. The operators said: “Of course, you read everything, here are the documents; You have read even more, but it was necessary to talk about paying for the difference when the report was submitted, but now it is no longer supposed to be. ” Well, no, no. So the court decision [that we completed the contract] took place, but, as you know, this means nothing in Russia. Therefore, we wrote a claim to the FSIN, like - what the hell? About such a claim. They did not answer us, so we filed a lawsuit in arbitration about protecting a business reputation. Their lawyers at the preliminary meeting realized that now we would not have to prove that we had lectures, but to them [that the statement of Rudo is true]. I think it was a turning point, they fussed. The Investigative Committee still pressed us, twice, but both checks did not find anything at all. I suspect that this is [the director of the FSIN and the head of Rudogo Gennady] Kornienko, as a native of the FSB, pressed on the UK.

-And what, in your opinion, are the motives of Rudogo?

-I think the personal motive is such a machism [former] Major of the missile forces ( the FSIN website says that Rudy graduated from the military school in 1988 and until 1994 served in the Armed Forces-approx. Medusa ), who very quickly became Lieutenant General [internal service] in the FSIN: I will show you, who can do the main one and what I can do with you. ” Something so indefatigable, stupid, short-sighted and bureaucratic. Now the FSIN understands that on December 6 they will have a worldwide shame and I will make them either apologize or go on trial, because then I will seek a criminal case for a false denunciation. It is clear that it will not be immediately, and not this year, but in a couple of years I would not give a broken penny for the legal security of some citizens. I am stubborn and vengeful, and they have a composition in its pure form.

Evgeny Berg