He held on to a National Guard member and hit a car: the first criminal cases for the January 23 protests

OVD-Info defends the right to freedom of peaceful assembly. On January 23, some protesters committed isolated acts of violence against police officers. While not approving violent clashes, we must not forget that in fact, in not a single city did the authorities even try to organize safe and accessible sites for those wishing to join the all-Russian action.

At the same time, numerous evidence and videos show that the protest was peaceful, and individual manifestations of aggression do not turn the entire event into non-peaceful and do not justify either the forceful dispersal of the protests or the mass detention of their participants. At the same time, according to OVD-Info, the police used force during arrests in 27 cities, as a result of which at least 64 people were injured. The detainees talked about hematomas, bruises, broken fingers, dislocations, broken heads and noses, and a cut hand. People were hit on the head with batons, thrown to the floor of a paddy wagon and kicked, and electric shockers were reported to be used.

As has been the case for many years, virtually no cases of police officers using unprovoked and disproportionate violence at rallies on January 23 were investigated and no one was punished for it. Despite numerous facts , criminal cases are not being opened against employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the National Guard.

Life doesn't suit you

“Boy, why aren’t you satisfied with life? Wonderful children, cars, go on vacation. The topics are only about rallies, about the change of power,” there are now many such posts from “pro-government” commentators on Valery Evsin’s VKontakte page.

32-year-old Evsin posted beautiful photographs with his young children, as well as links to various opposition videos and texts - by Valery Solovy, Alexei Navalny and others. Evsin came to Moscow to work as a taxi driver. According to lawyer Maxim Pashkov, they found him in his car.