Kemerovo bloggers and participants of the project "Don't be inert" Maksim Lavrentyev and Sergey Kamensky were sentenced to real prison terms - nine and five years in a general regime penal colony, respectively. Kamensky was taken into custody in the courtroom. Another blogger, Anatoly Sadovin, was given a three-year suspended sentence. This was reported by a support group for the defendants in the case.
The punishment for Lavrentyev and Kamensky coincided with the one requested by the prosecutor's office. The prosecution asked for Sadovin to be sentenced to three years in prison.
Three bloggers were arrested in June 2020 in connection with a criminal case of hooliganism. Kamensky and Lavrentyev were charged with hooliganism due to a conflict with a driver during a raid to combat illegal parking, which the bloggers conducted in April 2020. The investigation believes that Lavrentyev and Kamensky sprayed pepper gas from a canister towards the driver and his companion. Sadovin was filming a video at the time.
Lavrentyev and Kamensky were placed in custody. Kamensky was soon transferred to house arrest, then back to pretrial detention, and in November 2020, again to house arrest.
In October 2020, Lavrentyev was accused of using dangerous violence against a government official (Part 2, Article 318 of the Criminal Code). According to investigators, during another raid, the blogger sprayed pepper gas at an employee of the Kemerovo UFSB.
"Lavrentyev and Kamensky deny their guilt under the charges brought against them. They claim that in the episode with the driver they themselves were attacked while filming, and used the spray cans as self-defense. They also regarded the episode with the FSB officer as an unmotivated attack by an unknown person with the aim of stealing a video camera, and their actions as counteracting robbery by an unknown person," writes "Support for Political Prisoners. Memorial."
In 2021, in addition to the charge of hooliganism (Part 2 of Article 213 of the Criminal Code), Lavrentyev and Kamensky were charged with inciting hatred or enmity (clause "b" of Part 2 of Article 282 of the Criminal Code) due to videos about law enforcement officers. Sadovin was also charged with inciting hatred or enmity, and this is the only article he was charged with. Before the verdict, he was under a written undertaking not to leave the country.
In addition, Lavrentyev and Kamensky were charged with causing minor bodily harm out of hooligan motives using objects used as weapons (paragraphs "a" and "b" of Part 2 of Article 115 of the Criminal Code), and Kamensky was also charged with assault (Article 116 of the Criminal Code), write "Network Freedoms". Due to the expiration of the statute of limitations, they were released from punishment under these articles. What exactly formed the basis of these charges is unknown.
The trial has been ongoing since August 2021.
- Lavrentyev had been held in a cell in the basement of the local pretrial detention center No. 1 since March 2023 , which caused him to develop health problems - a chronic illness and back pain from drafts. In January 2024, a support group reported that he had been transferred to another cell.
- The YouTube channel “Don’t be inert!” published videos about violations by law enforcement officers, but all videos have now been removed.