The Moskovsky District Court of Kaliningrad received a case against local journalist and activist Mikhail Feldman, who is being prosecuted under the article on repeated discrediting of the army (Part 1 of Article 280.3 of the Criminal Code). The case appeared in the court file; Feldman’s interests are represented by lawyer from OVD-Info Maria Bontsler.
The journalist became a defendant in a criminal case because of a post and repost on VKontakte. He was detained on May 8, two days later the court chose a ban on certain actions as a preventive measure. Prior to this, Feldman was prosecuted under the administrative article on discrediting the army (Article 20.3.3 of the Administrative Code) - after attending an anti-war rally on March 6, 2022, he was fined 30 thousand rubles.
In 2020, Feldman was sentenced to two months of restriction of freedom for insulting state symbols (Article 329 of the Criminal Code) due to publications on the social network: he posted images of the Russian tricolor with the inscription “wipe your feet”, the coat of arms of Russia with an expletive inscription, as well as an image of the flag nearby with a human anus. During his last word on this case, Feldman, while in the courtroom, took a Russian flag from his jacket pocket, threw it on the floor and stomped on it, saying: “Wipe your feet!” Because of this, a new case was opened against him under the article of insulting state symbols. On March 3, 2021, Feldman was sentenced to six months of restricted freedom. On June 7, the appellate court commuted the sentence to five months of suspended imprisonment.
In 2015, Feldman was found guilty under articles of possession of explosives (Article 222 of the Criminal Code) and hooliganism by a group of persons motivated by political hatred or enmity (Part 2 of Article 213 of the Criminal Code) for hanging a German flag in the garage of the FSB department in Kaliningrad. Then he was sentenced to a year, a month and 23 days in prison, but was released in the courtroom, taking into account the time spent in the pre-trial detention center.
- Since February 24, 2022—the first day of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine—residents of Russian cities have been holding anti-war protests every day and talking about the tragedy online. Anti-war speeches and statements become grounds for criminal prosecution. At the moment, more than 750 people have become defendants in criminal cases initiated due to protest against the war with Ukraine. Read more about this in our infographic .
- Article 280.3 (Public actions aimed at discrediting the armed forces of the Russian Federation) was included in the Criminal Code in March 2022 - in this way the government responded to anti-war speeches and statements, as well as the dissemination of information about the war that does not come from official Russian sources. On March 14, 2023, the State Duma adopted amendments increasing the maximum penalty under this article, since then it has been seven years in prison.