Tit in the hands of the law

What is wrong in the examination in the case of blogger Vladislav Sinitsa, who was in prison due to a statement on Twitter

From the editorial office
In May of this year, the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) hosted an expanded meeting of the Commission on Combating the Falsification of Scientific Research, at which the assistant professor was the assistant to the Higher School of Economics, candidate of historical sciences Dmitry Dubrovsky with a message about the falsification of forensic examinations. According to the amicus curiae community (translated from Latin - “court of a court”), one of the founders of which is Dubrovsky, about 15 authorized “non -profit” organizations that make any examinations to order with the result obviously known to the customer.

Even in his report, Dubrovsky noted that, for example, in the Russian Institute of Cultural Studies there was a “battle group of experts” in the person of the doctor of cultural sciences Vitaly Batova and teacher of mathematics, psychologist Natalia Kryukova. In total, according to Dubrovsky’s estimates, “more than 50 of their examinations ended with prosecution sentences - from fines to real prison terms.”

And in some cases, people who perform strange examinations to order find a place in the institutes of the Russian Academy of Sciences and “trade” examinations without informing colleagues. This, in fact, forced the Academy to engage in supervision of experts, because, according to the law, RAS - the highest expert organization in the country. Based on the results of the consideration of the report, the Dubrovsky commission of the Russian Academy of Sciences stated in its resolution that measures were required "... both to protect the reputation and independence of the academic community, and to correct negative practice with a special forensic examination in Russian law enforcement."

We publish the material of Dmitry Dubrovsky, who specifically for Novaya Gazeta appreciated the work of experts in the Blogger case Vladislav Sinitsa, who was in prison for a statement on Twitter about the children of the security forces.

Andrey Zasakin - "New Gazeta"

When a high -ranking official calls in response to the wounded riot police “smear the liver of protesters on asphalt”, it seems that no one has questions about responsibility for saying, calling for violence in relation to the “protesters” social group. Indeed, the press secretary of the Russian president cannot be an extremist? Extremists are those who write some tweets and posts on the Internet, by default-“opposition”, that is, almost everyone who criticizes the authorities in one way or another.

As the head of the publicity protection fund Alexei Simonov was once minted: “Extremism is a disagreement with the opinion of the authorities, expressed in a sharp form.”

Now the process is completed, which began for a long time, when in the early 2000s, not only those of them that are considered extremism-all kinds of violent and non-violent actions that violate racial, ethnic and religious equality-but also various actions directed hypothetically against the constitutional order and the existing state-owned order were also considered in Europe. building.

If at first the victims of such laws were, for example, members of the NBP banned in Russia, now bloggers. And if earlier, to accuse in extremism, it was still necessary to capture the president’s reception room, now there is enough tweet that would be defined as “a call for violent actions against any social group”.

The social group began to be understood either by the police, or any other representatives of the authorities, or even “power as a whole”.

The beginning of this process was laid by the already forgotten case of Savva Terentyev, who emotionally proposed to burn corrupt “cops” in the square - and was immediately accused of inciting social growth. A group of experts, consisting of four psychologists, a sociologist and historian, who at that time, represented the Kazan Pedagogical Institute, the Academy of the State Service and Syktyvkar State University, came to the conclusion that "the content of the text is aimed at initiating hatred and hostility in relation to a group of persons - police officers and their representatives."

Terentyeva was found guilty, and the Supreme Court of the Komi Republic in 2008 approved such an understanding of the social group in which representatives of the state de-Jure became a social group, which is possible to incite enmity and rake. This kind of idea later led to the condemnation of the journalist Irek Murtazin, who was accused of inciting a social rheast to the social group - "regional power of Tatarstan." The conclusion in the case was given by Oksana Grunchenko, a candidate of philological sciences, an employee of the Vinogradov Institute of Russian Language. Murtazin on the basis of this examination was sentenced to a real term of imprisonment.

It is significant that the European Court of Human Rights in 2018 considered such a violation of Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights, although he agreed that, as part of the lack of interpretation, the Police could be considered by the state as a group subject to protection within the 282th article. Earlier, in 2017, the same court issued a decision in the case of the head of the Society of Russian-Chechen Friendship, Stanislav Dmitrievsky, who was convicted in 2006 for two years conditionally for the publication of the letter of Aslan Maskhadov.

In the case of Dmitrievsky, an examination of the philologist, an employee of the Department of the Russian Language of the Nizhny Novgorod State Linguistic University Larisa Teslenko, in which

Social groups, in respect of which the journalist incurred the discord and hatred, was named no less “the leadership of the Russian Empire” and the “crazy Kremlin bloody regime”.

The ECHR considered that when considering this case, not only the principle of freedom of speech was violated, but, importantly, the examination did not meet the requirements of Russian legislation.

The examination in the case of blogger Vladislav Tsitsa was conducted by employees of the Center for Sociocultural Expertise Alexander Tarasov and Natalia Kryukova.

This center is well known to those who are interested in the political history of Russia. The track record of his employees contains Pussy Riot cases, Jehovah's Witnesses and historian Yuri Dmitriev. Each time, these experts act exclusively on the side of the prosecution.

As one of the leading experts of this center, Doctor of Culturology Vitaly Batov, once stated in one of the processes, “always does what the customer wants from him”.

These experts, who grew up in the bowels of the Institute of Culturology, quite often prepare examinations that amaze with their novelty and the depth of reading. Thus, Natalia Kryukova (primary school mathematics teacher) and the same Vitaly Batov are known, in particular, an examination in which the phrase “kill the slave” was recognized as extremist. Their other works, each time performing any vagaries of the investigation, in which the police and other state -owned employees, were no less striking, have presented exclusively as a “social group”.

I believe that the outrage of the expert community with the absolute and transcendental shamelessness with which the experts of the center serve the indictment have already led to some limitation of their omnipotent influence in Moscow, and now they often make examinations by order of the regions. But in the case of a blogger, Sinitsa, apparently, turned out that only experts of this center agree to sign such a monstrous conclusion.

Indeed, a blogger phrase, which is separately torn from the context, does not sound very ethical and even threatening, however, international standards and the European court are constantly urging not only the statement itself, but also its context, the size of the audience, and the assessment of the potential threat.

Of course, experts Natalia Kryukova and Alexander Tarasov received an unequivocal task - right in the text of the expert opinion, they honestly admit that the investigation had the need to explore the statement of the todnie blogger for the subject

“The presence of signs of the call of users - a wide range of persons, to apply violence against close relatives of law enforcement officials, calls for kidnapping children exclusively law enforcement officials, followed by reprisal against them, other signs of enlightenment and hatred of all law enforcement officials and members of their families.”

Then I immediately remembered the old joke: the correct question of the teacher of history should look like this: “Between whom and who were the Greek-Persian wars?”

In general, in response to the urgent request of the investigation, experts - a candidate of pedagogical and political sciences, respectively (that is, not a single linguist) - immediately issued a conclusion.

“Immediately” is not a figure of speech, the conclusion was prepared in a record four days.

The conclusion itself consists of 20 pages, and what the authors call “analysis” occupies four pages. The todnie blogger in response to the user's replica “Voice of Mordor”, where protesters are described as “cowardly dricema”, who should not be lifted up by the police, because “next time they [police] will not be so kind and polite”, replies that this kind of actions may also have consequences in the form of possible revenge. A completely hypothetical situation of possible revenge in response to a possible escalation of violence against protesters is discussed.

But experts of Kryukov and Tarasov immediately qualify the mention of the police in the text of the tit with a manipulation - the creation of the "image of the enemy", and then summarize that

“The user <...> expresses a negative attitude to this group in the form of verbal aggression and a stack that demonstrate destructive behavior that contradicts the norms of existence in society, which causes moral and physical ( *so in the text! - *Ed. ) Damage to others, as well as causing psychological discomfort of other communicants.”

Specialists of ANO “Forensic Expert” Philologists Maria Kulikova and Alexander Karagodin in their alternative opinion, which provided the defense, just indicate that the statement about children is, first of all, imaginary, there is no category of calling for such actions; Moreover, we are talking about a spontaneous reactive statement, which was the result of a provocation in the text of the user “Voice of Mordor”, predicting violence against protesters from the police.

There is no contrast in the statement itself, and therefore it is impossible to consider it as a real call for action.

However, the presence of an alternative conclusion was not at all embarrassed by a judge who is familiar - and this is a very common situation - without evaluating the content of the conclusions, apparently “by internal conviction”, believes that the conclusion of the candidate of pedagogical sciences of Kryukova and political scientist Tarasov “objectively”, but there are no two practitioners of philologists.

One can only predict that when this text reaches the European Court of Human Rights - and it will clearly reach, since there are no hope for our higher judicial authorities, Russia again, as it was already in previous cases, will not only lose with a bang, but will also receive another commentary on the quality and content of the examination, which Russian courts accept.

It is curious that after the loss of the affairs of Dmitrievsky by Russia, expert Teslenko (according to which the journalist incurred the discord and hatred in relation to the “leadership of the Russian Empire”) ceased to be an expert at the Ministry of Justice: it simply did not undergo another re -certification. Apparently, the Ministry of Justice is still interested in the quality of its expertise.

But the Investigative Committee of Russia, which recently received the right to conduct a special forensic examination, in real cases demonstrates such a quality of expert conclusions to which both the department itself and the court should respond. I believe, however, that the case of a title, given the situation, will come to the ECHR faster, and the examinations laid down on its foundation will receive proper legal assessment.