Court of Vladimir Egorov

April 23 at 10:30 in the Toropetsk District Court of the Tver Region will begin consideration of the case of opposition Vladimir Egorov. He is accused of extremism for accommodating on the VKontakte social network a post with an appeal to “bring down the main Kremlin rat”. The activist is defended by the lawyer of "Agora" Svetlana Sidorkina.

Egorov headed the local branch of the Yabloko party. He faces up to five years in prison under part 2 of article 280 of the Criminal Code (public calls for extremism via the Internet).

On March 29, Yegorovpublished an indictment on Facebook. According to the document, on August 5, 2016, Yegorov posted in the group “Citizens of Toropts” (now deleted) the post for which he began to pursue him, and on August 11 the operative of the Tver UFSB department in the city did “inspection of the Internet page” and discovered a record of Vladimir Putin, after which its author “calls for physical violence” regarding physical violence ”regarding physical violence President, about what an act was about.

The testimonies against Egorov as witnesses gave a “specialist in the field of information technology”, who participated in the “inspection” of the VK group of the activist, as well as two residents of the Toroptsy - T. Evmenova and another citizen, who were attracted to the “publication” as “public representatives”. The first two witnesses said that among all posts in the group "Citizens of the Toroptsy" they especially "remembered" the record about Putin, and they regarded the word "to blame" as an appeal for the murder of the president. The testimonies of the third witness "in fact and content are similar to" the testimony of Evmenova, the conclusion said.

Another resident of the Toroptsy - V. Kalashnikov - said during interrogation that in the VK group of Egorov there were materials in which "the need to apply violence to representatives of the current government of the country and" combat corruption "was justified. These publications could "negatively affect the healthy sociocultural development of youth," the witness noted.

Also, in the case of Egorov, the FSB interrogated the leader of the Tver branch of Yabloko Alexander Sorokin and the instructor of the party department Taisiy Kirillov. Both party functionary said that they were not personally familiar with Egorov. The activist himself claims the opposite.

In addition, it follows from the indictment, the FSB listened to Egorov’s phone. Employees of the special services recorded some conversations of the activist about the "placement circumstances" of the post from the case that he led from October 20 to 21, 2016.

The post , for which Egorov began to pursue, was a commentary on the article published in the Novaya Gazeta, you need to go to another job ”; Egorov brought a link to the article in his post. The article is dedicated to the famous replica of Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev - the official told the teacher who complained to a low salary that high incomes should go to business.

“You need to understand that all these“ statements ”in the public of these morons with a zero rating that occupy high posts are nothing more than part of Gabni’s special operation to impose the main culprit of all troubles, his close -minded Kodla,” Yegorov said in his comments. “The main Kremlin rat with his friends, the rest will be scattered to dust itself!”

The publication was accompanied by a photograph of Putin with the inscription on the forehead "main rat".

Two linguistic examinations were conducted in the case. According to the results of one of them, Egorov’s post contains “signs of a motivation for the murder of Putin and his“ closest environment ”. The word "accomplice" used in the text indicates that the "leaders of the Russian Federation as a whole" led by Putin "are criminal criminals," the results of another study said.

On October 20, 2016, even before the initiation of the case, the FSB officers conducted the "examination" of the house of Egorov and seized the system unit from the activist. The case against Egorov was opened on May 19, 2017. On June 8, the activist visited the FSB during interrogation. He, as well as that of Sidorkina, took subscriptions about non -disclosure.

Egorov himself associated the factory of the case with the anti -corruption investigations that he published in the "citizens of the Toropian". One of the investigations concerned the illegal removal of sand from quarries by the local company Spetsstroy, controlled by the head of the Toropetsky district, Alexander Brida and the head of the Westwinsky regional department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Viktor Smirnov. In April 2017, shortly after the publication of this text, Andrei Smirnov, the son of a police chief, a stone broke a window in the opposition’s house.

On June 13, the opposition went to Ukraine and asked for political asylum in the department of the State Migration Service in Chernigov. In the same city, he got a job.

Meanwhile, on the night of June 24 to 25, unknown people set fire to Egorov’s house in Toroptsa. There were a wife and minor daughter of an activist. One of the passers -by noticed a fire and caused firefighters, so the flame managed to extinguish in time.

On July 5, when Egorov was supposed to receive a preliminary decision on the status of a refugee, the SBU operatives came to his house. The emigrant was taken to a neutral strip between Ukraine and Russia in the area of ​​the Ukrainian checkpoint "Senkovka". The security forces explained that Egorov was denied refugee status, since Russia allegedly did not put him on the wanted list. According to the activist, then the Ukrainian border guards issued a protocol for it for an illegal crossing of the border without a passport and banned the entry to Ukraine for three years. The SBU later assured that Egorov was not deported, and he was not forbidden to enter Ukraine.

At the same time, according to Ukrainian laws, after refusing to provide asylum, the emigrant had five days to appeal the decision.

After deportation, Egorov went to Belarus. In Minsk, he turned to the Office of the UN Supreme Commissioner for Refugees, as well as to human rights defenders.

Since July 29, the emigrant stopped in touch. On August 1, the Belarusian human rights organization Human Constanta found out that on July 28 he was detained in his hostel by the Belarusian KGB. Earlier on the day of detention, Yegorov informed the Human Constanta employees that he was put on the wanted list.

On July 31, the deputy chairman of the October District Court of Minsk for criminal cases, Alexander Rudenko, arrested a refugee for two days under Article 17.1 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of Belarus (petty hooliganism).

Meanwhile, on the evening of August 1, the FSB investigator from Toroptz contacted Sidorkina and said that Egorov had been taken to his city and detained. Two days later, the opposition was sent to the pre-trial detention center-1 in Tver.

However, on November 16, the investigator of the Tver UFSB freed Egorov on a recognizance not to leave . The reasons for this were not explained. The Code of Criminal Procedure allowed the security forces to petition for further extension to the activist of the arrest.