The series of criminal cases in the wake of the summer protests in Moscow, unofficially dubbed the "Moscow case", is losing steam and is unlikely to result in a high-profile show trial: it looks like it will not result in a second Bolotnaya case. But the signals are mixed and multidirectional: the termination of cases against five defendants - and simultaneously new arrests, the first real terms for two defendants - and a softening of the preventive measure for two others, a failure to collect evidence of mass unrest - and a new case of extremism. But there is no reason to count on the complete collapse of the case, and besides, the security forces still have the opportunity to launch a mass application of criminal prosecution under the article for repeated violations of the rules for holding rallies: the leaders of the street opposition already have a basis for this in the form of numerous fines and arrests.

September 3 became an important day for several defendants in the rapidly investigated Moscow case, which unites cases of mass riots, the use of violence against Rosgvardiya officers and police officers, a tweet about the children of security officials, and repeated violations of the law on holding rallies. All of them are the result of protests in Moscow against the non-admission of independent candidates to the Moscow City Duma elections. The main news was the termination by the Investigative Committee (SKR) of criminal prosecution of five defendants (Sergey Abanichev, Daniil Konon, Valery Kostenok, Vladislav Barabanov and Yegor Zhukov) in the case of mass riots due to the lack of corpus delicti; three have already been released from pretrial detention, having received the right to rehabilitation. This is good news, although unexpected: for example, one of those released, Kostenok, even admitted guilt: he threw a plastic bottle at a police officer. Perhaps the investigation decided to get rid of the defendants whose actions clearly do not qualify as "mass riots" or are poorly documented - so to speak, to distill the accusation. However, the actions of those who remain accused in the riot case do not look impressive, and it does not seem that cutting off some of the defendants from the trial strengthens the overall plot of the mass riot case.

Yesterday, the first sentences were also announced in another case – violence against law enforcement officers. Ivan Podkopaev (sprayed a gas canister, had a hammer and a knife with him) and Danila Beglets (according to the investigation, pushed a police officer, according to his own version, picked up the headphones that had fallen from the detainee and handed them to him) were given three and two years in a general regime penal colony. Both admitted their guilt and agreed to a special procedure for considering the case. It is symptomatic that the case of violence against police officers, separated from the general one, was initially perceived as an auxiliary one, necessary to prove the fact of mass riots in Moscow – however, it is the defendants in this case who seem to have the best chance of being sentenced to real terms.

The harshest sentence – five years in prison – was given to blogger Vladislav Sinitsa, convicted of extremism: the court found incitement of hatred and a threat to children in his tweet about possible revenge on the children of security officials. No matter how disgusting this tweet looked, these were only words and reasoning, not direct threats and calls for violence, and stupidity is not a criminal offense.

But at the same time, the Moscow case continues to grow: two new defendants, Nikita Chirtsov and Eduard Malyshevsky, have been arrested in the violence case. Zhukov, who was accused of participating in mass riots, was asked by the Investigative Committee of Russia yesterday to be transferred from the pretrial detention center to house arrest (the investigation also asked for a softening of the preventive measure for Sergei Fomin). But later it became known that he was charged under a new article on extremism on the Internet, and then the charge of participating in mass riots was dropped.

The conflicting signals from the court and the investigation can be perceived as a partial defeat of the security forces: the evidence base for a high-profile show trial in the case of “mass riots” – peaceful protests – turned out to be weak. The large-scale campaign of support for the defendants in the case of riots and violence, the long lists of those who stood up for them, obviously played a role. As a result, the chances for a high-profile show trial, even remotely reminiscent of the Bolotnaya case of 2012-2014 in terms of the number of defendants and convicts, the scale of retaliatory violence, the severity of sentences and the possible propaganda effect, are falling – but other cases are growing in its place. And there is no point in counting on the case being completely closed: this will raise the question of the responsibility of the authorities and security forces for the brutal dispersal of the protests.

The wave of administrative cases for violations at rallies, arrests and fines (for Lyubov Sobol, the amount has already exceeded one million rubles) is not abating. Repeated violations are grounds for a criminal case: on Tuesday, the Tverskoy District Court began considering such a case against Konstantin Kotov. This article of the Criminal Code, which is still rare, could become a time bomb, a flickering threat for at least a dozen well-known representatives of the opposition and many ordinary Muscovites who took to the streets in July-August 2019.

Distillation of mass riots