The author of the musical project “Pre-Revolutionary Soviet”, poet Vyacheslav Malakhov, sentenced to two years in prison in the case of repeated discrediting of the army (Part 1 of Article 280.3 of the Criminal Code), was taken to pre-trial detention center-2 in Sosnogorsk. The telegram channel of the support group reports this with reference to Malakhov’s letter.
“I’m in the Republic. Komi, in pre-trial detention center No. 2, Sosnogorsk near Ukhta. I’m without everything, I have clothes, I don’t have food (which is my own), I spent everything on the road and in Vologda,” he writes. The support group does not specify when this letter was sent.
Malakhov said that during the transfer, food was stolen from him and other convicts: “Two rations and a bag of my cigarettes were stolen from me and my fellow travelers (we are shocked and outraged!) <...> Rations and whitefish were stolen by other prisoners going to the transfer to the north , we realized this later <...> In general, I helped a lot of people with cigarettes, painkillers, socks, I don’t understand why they would steal things from me.”
He adds that he survived the stage normally, but the conditions were difficult: “We need more carriages so that there is no crowding. There are 10 people traveling in a compartment-like room.”
Malakhov also reported that in the pre-trial detention center they took away all his medications, books and colored pencils. He said that letters can be sent to this detention center using the Zonatelecom and FSIN-letter services, and asked everyone who wrote to him since December 16 to redirect the letters to SIZO-2 in Sosnogorsk.
In October, the Khamovnichesky District Court of Moscow sentenced Malakhov to two years in a general regime colony because of two posts about the war in Ukraine. In one, he discussed the hypocrisy of the Russian government, and in the second, he compared the contradictory statements of officials about the war and the Russians who left the country because of it.
In court, Malakhov spoke about his condition in custody: “I feel bad every day in the pre-trial detention center. “I’m sitting with people who committed real crimes because they said something on the Internet.”
You can write to Malakhov through the Zonatelecom and FSIN-Letter services or by regular mail at the following address:
169 500, Komi Republic, Sosnogorsk, Lyayol village, 13
FKU SIZO-2 Federal Penitentiary Service of Russia in the Komi Republic
Malakhov Vyacheslav Igorevich, born in 1985.
- After the start of the war in Ukraine, the Russian authorities began to react sharply to protest sentiments. The list of articles under which those who oppose the war are prosecuted is quite wide. Those involved in “anti-war cases” are often charged with hooliganism, vandalism, violence against government officials, and other violations. A significant element of pressure was also the articles introduced into the Criminal Code after the outbreak of hostilities - the spread of “fakes” about the Russian army and discrediting the armed forces.
- More than 1,100 people have already become defendants in criminal cases initiated due to protests against the war with Ukraine. Read more about this in our infographic .