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Found stickers, rejoiced

On Sunday evening, August 7, electricity went out in the apartment of Vitaly Gotra and his wife Natalya (she asked not to give her last name) in Volgograd. Some voices were heard from the hallway at the entrance. Natalya opened the door to check the electrical panel, but did not have time: security forces burst into the apartment. “Some immediately tied me up, others ran into the room, my husband was in his shorts, he was going to sleep. With a roar they laid him on the floor with his muzzle, they put me aside and told me not to move, ”says Natalya.

The apartment began to be searched, the witnesses invited the neighbors on the porch. Vitaliy Gotra told Kholod that the investigator produced a search warrant, which contained an article about fraud. “They said they were looking for fake documents that my husband allegedly took a loan for, but the documents they saw were not of interest to them,” says Natalya. “And then they found the [anti-war] stickers and immediately got excited and started taking pictures of them.”

Two phones, two computers, three flash drives, stickers with anti-war inscriptions and materials for making them were confiscated from Vitaly and Natalya. “A copy of the protocol of the search and seizure of things was not given. They said we weren't supposed to,” says Gotra. After the search, he was allowed to dress and was taken to the police station around 11 pm.

“The night, of course, did not sleep, I was shaking all over. The throat was so squeezed that she could neither eat nor drink, - says Natalya. “I used to think that people exaggerate that they can’t eat because of stress, but it turned out that this really happens.”

When the police took Gotra to the police station, his wife was told that they would put him in a "monkey house". “I call there the next day, they tell me that they don’t have Vitalik. They gave me the phone number of the interrogating officer, who drew up the protocol of the search. I couldn't get through to her for two days. Only on the second day in the evening I found out that he was in a special detention center. We then had a fierce heat, more than 40 degrees. I was very worried that they didn’t give him food or water, ”recalls Natalya.

The true enemy of the Russian people

Vitaliy Gotra was born and spent his childhood in the village of Kazanka, Mykolaiv region, Ukraine. He entered the university in Nikolaev - he liked the city, and Gotra stayed in it. Vitaly, like his future wife Natalya, was fond of online games: in 2012 they met in the game World of Warcraft. Vitaly found out that Natalya was living in Russia and moved in with her the same year. At first they lived in the Moscow region, and in 2017 they got married and soon moved to Volgograd, where Natalia's parents live.

In 2020, Gotra received Russian citizenship, but he did not stop considering himself a Ukrainian: “Nationality is not about where you live, but about where you were born, grew up, what surrounded you.”

“Back in 2014, when the “little green men” appeared in Crimea, I was under a lot of stress. And after February 24, I didn’t sleep for a week, I monitored the news,” Gotra says. - I thought about the protest in February, but until the end of July I thought about what to do, nurtured the idea. Decided to make stickers because I could make them easily since I worked in a print shop.”

According to Vitaly, he made a cliche - the basis of stickers with text and an image - and stamped them. “I can say in general terms what was written there: information about who the true enemy of the Russian people is, and a call for peace,” says Vitaly.

Gotra pasted stickers late at night so that no one would notice him: mainly on access doors, poles and lanterns near intersections. “According to the protocol, someone was returning home, saw the sticker and called the police. Apparently, they mobilized all the forces there, called the entire staff of the local branch and employees of the “E” center ( a unit under the Ministry of Internal Affairs, which is engaged in countering extremist activities. - Approx. “Cold” ). Probably, they watched the recordings of DVRs on the cars, the recordings of the cameras on the streets, they used everything they could to find me, ”says Vitaly.

Demonstration of Nazi symbols

Although the search was conducted in connection with a fraud case, Gotra saw “a whole pile of protocols” in his name at the police station. According to him, each volume was like half a pack of paper. Vitaly Gautra had to write an explanatory note and sign each protocol - this went on from about 11 pm to half past four in the morning.

“Due to the fact that they found cliches and stickers on me, I decided not to deny anything. I immediately admitted that I really made and pasted them, - says Vitaly. - I spent the night in the department, and the next day they took me without laces, without a belt, like a poor fellow, to the court. And they not only took away the laces and the belt, they also took away the glasses, and my vision is -3. During the hearing, I saw the judge as a blur.”

On August 8, Vitaly was sentenced to 15 days of administrative arrest for "publicly displaying Nazi symbols, namely the swastika." But this punishment was only the beginning.

On August 10, Gotra was again taken to court, where they tried cases under 20 more administrative protocols: one protocol - one sticker. Each "case", as Vitaly says, was considered for 10 minutes. Three judges were invited to consider cases that day: Natalya Lomako, Ekaterina Nikitina and Anna Mitkovskaya. Then Gautre was assigned 20 more arrests for a total of 203 days.

It was not necessary to serve each of these arrests. “The new punishments were “ absorbed ” because they were imposed when Gotra was already serving his first arrest,” human rights activist Varya Mikhailova explained to Kholod. - The situation could be worse: if the protocols were submitted to the court sequentially and each was considered after the departure of Gautra's next arrest, he could spend three months under arrest. This is the maximum time for which a person, after committing an offense, can be held liable under the article “propaganda or public demonstration of Nazi paraphernalia or symbols” 20.3 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation.

infectious article

All 15 days, Natalya tried to get in touch with her husband: she wrote notes with the number of a new SIM card, which the employees promised to transfer along with the products. But Vitaly never called. When Natalya brought parcels to her husband and asked why he didn’t call, she was briefly answered: “So she doesn’t want to.”

“I arrived at the special detention center on August 22 to meet Vitalya,” says Natalya. “A police officer came up to me and told me not to wait for my husband. They say that at 21:47 he is released, and at 21:48 he will be arrested again. We were allowed to see each other for five minutes, and I found out why he did not call me all these two weeks. As it turned out, Vitaly never received a single note.

After the arrest of her husband, Natalya wanted to hire a lawyer, but no one agreed to take the case: “When they found out why Vitalik was detained, they immediately refused, as if it were some kind of contagious article. They said: “If he had a fight, it would be possible to take it. I don't work with that."

According to Vitaliy, employees of the "E" center came to him three times in the detention center. One of them asked for the addresses where the stickers were posted. Vitaly thought that they would be found anyway, and told him, hoping to avoid other punishments. But on August 23, he was given another seven days of administrative arrest for "demonstrating Nazism." The decision was made by Judge Ekaterina Nikitina.

On August 29, after serving two terms, Gotra left the special detention center and went to work the next day. There he learned that during the administrative detention, a search had also taken place in the printing house. Police officers interviewed all colleagues who worked with him on the same shift. And the director, in addition, was summoned to the department for a conversation: the police put pressure on him, asked him to fire Gotra under the article. Thanks to good relations with management, Gautre was allowed to write a statement of his own free will.

47 administrative protocols

On September 9, 13 more court hearings were held in the Voroshilovsky District Court of Volgograd on administrative violations of Vitaly Gotra. This time he was accused of 12 episodes of "discrediting" the Russian army and of making stickers with "swastika images".

Judge Yekaterina Nikitina fined Gautra 30,000 rubles for each of the 12 offenses for “discrediting”, and a fine of 1,000 rubles for making stickers. In total, Gotra had to pay fines for 361 thousand rubles.

“The stickers were small, the largest of them was six by nine centimeters. But they turned out to be expensive - 30 thousand rubles each, ”says Vitaly. After he was fined 361 thousand rubles, the media drew attention to the process. Then a lawyer got in touch with Gotra, who offered his paid defense services. Natalya and Vitaly were glad that at least someone was finally ready to work with them, and agreed.

According to Gotra, on September 15, in the Voroshilovsky District Court of Volgograd, he was found guilty of another 11 administrative violations (the latest protocols have not yet been posted on the court’s website). Judge Kristina Petrova imposed another 11 fines on 30 thousand rubles for each report.

By September 17, Vitaly Gotra had served 22 days of administrative arrest for posting anti-war stickers and received fines of 691,000 rubles. 47 protocols on administrative offenses were drawn up against him.

“If a person sticks stickers in about the same place for an hour, then this is one event, one offense – even if we agree that posting anti-war stickers can be an offense at all. Separating each sticker into a separate file is like writing five protocols on petty hooliganism for a person who uttered a sentence with five swear words: one for each word. But then the authorities went further: they drew up not one, but two protocols for each sticker. Allegedly, putting up each sticker became both an act of “propaganda of Nazism” and an act of “discrediting the Russian army,” comments human rights activist Varya Mikhailova.

Ran into trouble

Gotra's parents still live in the village of Kazanka: it is located not far from Krivoy Rog, which is shelled by Russian troops. And his brother lives in Nikolaev, near the southern front line. The last time Gotra visited relatives in Ukraine was in 2017: at first there was no time, and after 2020 coronavirus restrictions interfered.

The family lost contact with their son when his phones were confiscated during a search. For several days they could not get through to either him or Natalya. “They thought we were in a car accident. The search took place on Sunday evening, at which time we usually go home from the dacha,” says Natalia. - Then his mother found the phone number of the printing house where Vitalik worked, called. There, she was already informed in the personnel department that he had been detained and was serving his arrest.”

According to Vitaly, now his relatives are afraid of harming him and do not call. “We don’t communicate much so as not to arouse suspicion with calls to Ukraine,” Gotra says. - My goal now is to pay the fine. I don't regret what I did. If at least a few people saw my stickers and didn’t go to the “special operation”, then it’s not in vain. Or if a few people saw and realized that they have like-minded people in the city, this is also important.”

According to Natalia and Vitaly, their acquaintances did not support them. Friends commented on Gotra's anti-war action as meaningless, saying: “Well, what did you achieve? Just ran into trouble."