Translated material
A court in St. Petersburg fined a hearing-impaired person who cannot speak because of the action on January 31. Police said he was shouting slogans
A court in St. Petersburg has fined Yevgeny Agafonov, who is hard of hearing, after being detained at a rally in support of Alexei Navalny on January 31. This is reported by the "Apology of Protest".
Agafonov has a hearing disability of group III, in addition, he is unable to speak. As lawyer Sergei Loktev said, the man did not know about the action and did not participate in it - on January 31, he walked past the venue to the store.
The man was held at the police station for nine hours, he was not provided with a sign language interpreter. The lawyer stressed that due to the fact that Agafonov is hearing impaired, he could not understand the explanations of the police about his rights.
A report was drawn up against Agafonov on violating the rules for holding a rally and blocking roads (part 6.1 of article 20.2 of the Code of Administrative Offenses). In it, the police indicated that the man "jointly with other participants in the public event chanted slogans."
Result: a fine of 5,000 rubles. The court decided to impose a sentence below the lower limit.
- After the actions on 23 and 31 January and 2 February, the courts in St. Petersburg considered a total of 1,430 cases. In 354 cases, the persons involved in the cases were arrested, 659 people were fined.