“Stopping cannot be resumed” - law enforcement officers cannot decide on a case under Art. 282 in Tver

In December 2018, in the Tver region, due to the partial decriminalization of Art. 282 of the Criminal Code, the investigator announced the termination of the criminal case against 46-year-old manager Sergei Sokolov. In July 2019, it was reported that the case was dropped in January 2019, reopened in February, dropped again in March, and reopened again in April, dropped again in May, and reopened again. Thus, the criminal case against Sokolov, despite the decriminalization of the accusation article, is still under investigation.

On December 28, 2018, it became known that in the Tver region, the Investigative Committee announced the termination of the criminal case under Part 1 of Art. 282 of the Criminal Code (inciting national hatred). The decision of the IC is connected with amendments to the Criminal Code and the Code of Administrative Offenses, as a result of which Art. 282 of the Criminal Code. According to Pavel Chikov, head of the international human rights group Agora, this case is the first to be dismissed in connection with the amendments signed by Putin. The case was officially dismissed on January 18, 2019.

Recall that initially a criminal case was initiated against 46-year-old manager Sergei Sokolov, which, according to law enforcement agencies, since December 2015 from August 2017, published xenophobic Pictures. It is reported that in total about 15 images appear in the case.

According to the suspect, the police showed reposts from his page with pictures of the following content: on the first image of a man standing with his hand raised up (gesture reminiscent of the Nazi greetings), in the second - Russian President Vladimir Putin standing on the podium, behind which you can see a swastika, on the third - the nanny Gulchekhra Bobokulova, who killed a four-year-old girl in Moscow, with a halo on her head and the signature “Hero Russia". About the context in which these images were posted and contained whether they had any xenophobic signatures was not reported.

Sokolov's apartment was searched, as a result of which equipment was seized, including laptop and mobile phone.

In May 2019, Sokolov sent an appeal to the Zavolzhsky Interdistrict Investigation Department of Tver, where he demanded to provide him with information about his criminal case. In early July, an answer came to the appeal, the scans of which Sokolov published on his page on the VKontakte social network. This response confirms that in January 2019 the case under Art. 282 of the Criminal Code against him was terminated on the basis of the decriminalization of the article of accusation (part 2 of article 24 of the Code of Criminal Procedure). However, it follows from the published document that already on February 11, this decision was canceled by the prosecutor of the Proletarsky district, and on February 21, the case was reopened. The situation did not end there, and on March 21 the investigation again decided to dismiss the case (this time - on the basis of the absence of corpus delicti (clause 2, part 1, article 24 of the Code of Criminal Procedure)), but already on March 29, this decision was canceled by the prosecutor, and the case was reopened in April. In May 2019, the situation went into a new circle - the case was again closed (on the basis of the decriminalization of the prosecution article), and the prosecutor again canceled this decision. Thus, if the information disseminated is correct, then the case against Sokolov is still under investigation. Sources

• I received an answer from the IC of the city of Tver // Sergey Sokolov's page. In contact with. 2019. July 10.
• In Tver, an extremism case was opened against a local resident for reposting pictures on VKontakte // New Newspaper. 2018. August 7th.
• Started with fans, ended with hotels // Bugulma newspaper. 2018. July 1.
• The Investigative Committee closed the first repost case after Putin signed the law on the partial decriminalization of Article 282 // Mediazone. 2018. December 28.