How the “palace case” is developing: 134 defendants, 38 convicted

Alexei Navalny was arrested immediately after his return from Germany, where he was treated for poisoning, which the politician blames on the FSB. After these events and the release of the investigative film “Palace for Putin,” one of the most massive protest mobilizations began in Russia. Authorities admitted that in more than a hundred cities across Russia at the end of January and February 2021, they detained 17,600 protest participants. More than 130 people became involved in a series of criminal cases, which we call the “palace case . ”

“There has never been persecution of this scale for participation in protests in Russia,” said Alla Frolova, coordinator of legal assistance at OVD-Info, in April 2021. At the time of publication of this text, 25 lawyers from OVD-Info are defending 29 defendants in the “palace case.”

Found almost everyone

According to data collected by OVD-Info as of July 2021, a total of 134 people were prosecuted in the “palace case,” including 112 men and 22 women. Seven minors are known to be persecuted. The names of 11 people are still unknown.

“Almost everyone who was detained was found guilty. New arrests, especially mass ones, are unlikely to be expected - investigators have scraped out everything they could. Although, perhaps, they can still recognize individual participants in the actions,” suggests Alla Frolova, coordinator of legal assistance at OVD-Info. Of the 134 people, 96 were subject to criminal prosecution after the January 23 protest. There are much fewer criminal cases following other actions.

Regional distribution of the “palace case”: 34 people were persecuted in Moscow, 17 in St. Petersburg and the Primorsky Territory, 10 in the Chelyabinsk region, 8 in the Sverdlovsk region, 6 in the Kaluga region, 5 in Tatarstan, 4 in the Krasnoyarsk region, 3 each in the Novosibirsk and Nizhny Novgorod regions. Another 25 regions have one or two criminal cases.

“The distinctive features of [the “palace business”] are the variety of mechanisms of pressure and its scale, the spread of successful practices to the regions. The range of possible criminal sanctions is expanding. Unlike the “Moscow” (2019) and “Bolotnoye” (2012) cases, they are now not always associated with actions at the protests themselves: for example, they can be accused of violating sanitary and epidemiological standards, or involving minors in illegal activities,” says senior partner of Apology of Protest, Alexander Peredruk, who provides legal assistance to those detained at protests.

Judge for anything

Prosecutions for the actions of early 2021 include both criminal cases against specific people and several collective ones. 11 people are being persecuted in Moscow over a “sanitary case” - according to the authorities, 10 of them called for participation in protests and allegedly because of them, two dozen people with confirmed Covid came to the rally. This information was voiced by the Moscow mayor's office; it is impossible to verify it. One person was investigated under this article for coming to the protests with a positive coronavirus test.

11 people in Vladivostok and 9 in Chelyabinsk are being prosecuted in criminal cases for blocking roads. Cases have been opened against four editors of the student magazine DOXA and Leonid Volkov (former coordinator of the now banned headquarters of Alexei Navalny) for involving minors in activities dangerous to their lives.

— The most widely used article of the Criminal Code (45 people) is Part 1 of Art. 318 of the Criminal Code (non-life-threatening violence against a government official, up to five years in prison);

— 23 people were charged under Part 1 of Art. 267 of the Criminal Code (road blocking, up to a year in prison);

- 13 people - according to Part 3 of Art. 213 of the Criminal Code (calls for mass riots, up to three months of arrest).

— 10 people were charged under Part 1 of Art. 236 of the Criminal Code with approx. Part 4 Art. 33 of the Criminal Code (incitement to violate sanitary and epidemiological standards, up to two years in prison).

— 5 people were charged under Part 2 of Art. 213 of the Criminal Code (hooliganism, up to seven years in prison),

- 5 people under Article 212.1 of the Criminal Code (repeated violations at rallies, up to five years in prison),

- 5 people part 2 tbsp. 151.2 of the Criminal Code (involving minors in activities dangerous to their lives, up to three years in prison).

— From 1 to 4 defendants in the “palace case” are being prosecuted under another 18 different criminal qualifications.

“Cases are investigated quickly: a couple of months after arrest and a verdict. In Moscow there are harsher sentences, more actual sentences, in the regions they are softer, with more conditions,” notes Alla Frolova. According to OVD-Info, at least 38 sentences were handed down in the “palace case”. Criminal cases against at least ten people were dropped. Yevgeny Yesenov, a participant in the January 23 protests in Moscow, received the most severe punishment - four years in prison. He was accused of hitting a riot policeman in the head.