It is possible without extremism

Vladimir Putin softened the 282nd article, but the authorities do not intend to cancel it completely

On Wednesday, October 3, President Vladimir Putin introduced amendments to the State Duma, which significantly soften the punishment under the notorious 282nd article “Excitement of hatred or enmity”. According to them, for the first violation under this article, a person who had stopped the law is awaiting not criminal, but administrative punishment. And only then, if a relapse is already happening, the case is retrained in a criminal with a real (most likely) term. At the same time, two violations should occur within one year, and extremism for the first time will be punishable only by a fine of up to 20 thousand rubles, mandatory work or arrest up to 15 days.

Commenting on the presidential amendments, Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that in this way “the manifestation of insanity” is “corrected”-probably referring that there were too many resonant cases under the 282nd article. The head of the Agora Pavel Chikov has already calculated that many cases that are considered now or are considered earlier will be revised, and the sentences are most likely canceled. “The statute of limitations for bringing to administrative responsibility is one year, that is, for the majority there will be no administrative,” Chikov writes in his Telegram channel. The State Duma has already promised that it would be so likely: the chairman of the Committee on State Building and Legislation, Pavel Krasheninnikov, told Rain that the document in three readings could be adopted until the end of the autumn session.

It seems to be evident - the victory of civil society, which showed a rare unity in the face of an obvious threat. Putin took place publicly to Putin: during the “direct line”, deputy Sergei Shargunov did this. Now he says that he is ready to give all the laurels to others, but not without pride he clarifies that "Carthage should be destroyed, and now he has managed to break a large piece." “Of course, after my question, the president’s order appeared, I was preparing the papers that lay on the table, and I knew that there would be relief and softening,” says Shargunov “New”. - It is clear that I am for full decriminalization, but here the administrative is proposed for the “debutants”. But this is better than the next dragon law, and it is clear that the opposition of these attractions was also very strong. ”

The Kremlin could not take into account the public resonance around the case of “New Greatness”-the outrage of such a clear “fitting” of young people under the 282nd article was so strong that it resulted in the “Mother Mother”, and the petition of Novaya Gazeta on the website of Change.org demanding to stop this case drew almost 200 thousand signatures. In addition, even the Supreme Court was included in the discussion, which at first said that it was impossible to put everyone indiscriminately for the reposts, and then said the Chairman Vyacheslav Lebedev that “there were few more than 500 (a year)”. The number of criminal cases also grew significantly - that, in fairness, after the words of the president, all the state bodies were sincerely concerned.

But there are no strong illusions from new amendments, it is regret to regret the lawyers who are faced with such matters in practice. “This cannot be called the victory of civil society,” the lawyer of “Agora” Alexei Bushmakov is categorical. - The article is not completely decriminalized. These are half measures and the president’s reaction to indignation: in the wake of public indignation, the president decided to do something. This can be tried to perceive as a kind of first step towards liberalization, to the appearance of at least some discussion in the country. Now, in fact, any criticism of power, church or interethnic issues is prohibited, and discontent is already perceived as attacks on the foundations of the state system. ”

The half-heartedness of the actions of the authorities to mitigate the 282nd is also that the neutralization of this article is not enough: there is another 280 article that transfers such cases of “inciting” into the defense of the FSB (because of this, by the way, there is a version that Putin’s hardware weakens the Investigative Committee), there is an “insult to the feelings of believers” (148th article). “Perhaps the number of cases will increase on these articles now,” Bushmakov does not exclude. - It is also possible that we will see an inadequate reaction of law enforcement officers to new amendments. No one wants to lose the statistical "buns". The arbitrariness of law enforcement officers must fall under judicial control. Judges should not become accomplices in the desires to cut down a “stick”.

The hidden danger of presidential amendments is that the new design of punishments will actually exclude conditional terms for those who came across in the 282nd article for the second time in a year. The logic here is the following, lawyers explain: if earlier during the court it was possible to hope that their actions can be justified by chance or by the fact that “the demon has beg”, then the second violation gives the actions of the defendant a certain “ideological”.

For such punishment for “inciting”, even if it is on the Internet and the media, it may be much harsh: you were given the opportunity to improve, and you draw “figs” with the swastika for us.

But if such a scenario is possible, then later. Now, of course, in most cases, sentences will be maximally softened, and even if, before the adoption of the amendments, someone is condemned for real terms, they should be canceled immediately (any other development of events will be an additional reason for indignation).

Another reading of the 282nd article creates a danger to the media, since administrative responsibility can advance for legal entities-and this is up to half a million rubles, says Alexander Verkhovsky, director of the Owl information and analytical center.

“The Human Rights Council expressed a wish that the concept of“ humiliation of dignity ”was removed from the bill by various signs or remove the concept of“ social group ”, which is very easy to arouse from everywhere,” he says in an interview with the “new”. - As a result, they left everything as it is, only transferred to an administrative plane. These are very insufficient changes. ”

The human rights activist assumes that now there will be fewer “random” criminal cases of “likes” and reposts, but the number of administrative proceedings - taking into account their lightness, will increase sharply.

New amendments probably pursued another - important for such stories - the goal: to show that the president is “with the people” and he listens to him, everything around is bad, and he is definitely in white. But one does not deny the other that for someone a victory, for someone-a “tactical move,” says Verkhovsky. “It is important to watch what will happen next. A good option-the authorities will gather in spirit and will cancel something else or liberalize. The bad - and more likely - the topic with “extremist” articles on this will be considered closed, hoping that the public will calm down, ”he summarizes.

In general, the proposal made by the president is “better than nothing,” says human rights activist Lev Ponomarev, but the “sores” have not gone anywhere. “The most important problem of amendments is that the approach itself does not change that criminal prosecution for words and pictures is possible,” he says “new”. - But this is such a mentality of power: tightening punishments in order to maintain control. There is a great inertia of law enforcement agencies. And this inertia is not broken. ”

Kirill Goncharov

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- Of course, amendments cannot be called an exhaustive solution to the problem of planting people for likes and reposts. There are other articles in the Criminal Code, according to which people are condemned on the basis of a couple of videos and pictures - the same 280 or 148 articles. But most of the convicts for the Internet publications nevertheless took place under the 282 article, last year it was more than half a thousand convicts. Plus, it should be borne in mind that the administrative case has completely different statute of limitations - and since the Code of Administrative Offenses did not make other amendments, the new administrative article provides for the standard deadline for making a court decision - 3 months from the date of the offense. This means that from the moment of your publication before the sentence, no more than 3 months should pass, otherwise the case is simply terminated. And in these 3 months, the discovery of your publication by the authorities, and the initiation of the case, the examination on it, and other bureaucratic moments should fit.

According to the 282 article, we had business for posts published several years ago. And with new amendments, I honestly do not think that they will really be used as a punishment measure, simply because the terms are too limited, and even the organs will not even have a “stick” effect for the difficult article. Obviously, law enforcement officers, trying to get a “stick”, act the simplest way. If the distribution of memes is decriminalized, if, when assessing the actions of users, the courts will finally begin to study the context and determine the goals of citizens, then getting a “stick” will become much more difficult.

In my opinion, this is actually a complete decriminalization of the article. As for those who are now passing under Part 1 of Art. 282 of the Criminal Code - most likely, things are simply stuck even without retraining for administrative punishment, because, again, the statute of limitations. And those in relation to whom the conviction entered into force will remove this criminal record.

Of course, civil society with constant attention to the most absurd criminal cases played its positive role in this process. At the same time, Article 280 is more limited in its application and most likely there will be no “compensation”. In addition, the FSB in relation to anti -extremist legislation has not previously participated in the affairs of “for likes and reposts”, this structure is more serious. In any case, a decrease in reasons for criminal prosecution reduces the number of possible options for abuse. But a real victory will be when repressive articles for which they condemn people for other political views and position will not be in Russia. I am sure that we can achieve this. Therefore, for now, it is early to call a victory, but the first step towards it for sure.

Putin, as we see, did not give anyone such a potentially fertile topic. It is no secret that power structures are not enthusiastic about reducing their influence, and perhaps the president was the only one who could overcome their lobby. It is important, however, so that the trend begun by Putin does not limit himself to this amendment, but led to the complex reform of the entire law enforcement system.