In the Vologda region, a journalist was fined for criticizing a local official on social networks

The court fined the journalist of the Ustyuzhanochka newspaper Yuri Sedelkov because of comments addressed to the head of the Veliky Ustyug region, Alexander Kuzmin. This was reported by “7×7 - Horizontal Russia” with reference to the editor-in-chief of “Ustyuzhanochka” Antonid Smolina.

Sedelkov wrote negative comments about Kuzmin’s activities on his pages on social networks, which the official himself had added to the “black list” by that time. Because of these publications, Kuzmin tried to prosecute the journalist under criminal charges of libel (Article 128.1 of the Criminal Code). As a result, the court fined Sedelkov according to several protocols under the administrative article on libel (Article 5.61.1 of the Administrative Code). The amount of fines amounted to 30 thousand rubles.

Kuzmin filed a criminal complaint with the police in January. The official demanded that Smolina and journalist Olga Kulnevskaya be brought to justice over a stream in which they talked about their dismissal from the regional newspaper Sovetskaya Mysl. The journalists reported that the reason for their dismissal was their refusal to rewrite articles critical of the administration.