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He is accused under Part 3 of Art. 33 and part 4 art. 160 of the Criminal Code of Russia (“organizing the embezzlement of someone else’s property on an especially large scale”).
According to the investigation, in 2009, Alexey Navalny, working on a voluntary basis as an adviser to the head of the Kirov region, Nikita Belykh, organized the “theft of property” from the State Unitary Enterprise “Kirovles”. Having entered into a conspiracy with the director of Vyatka Forestry Company LLC (VLK) Petr Ofitserov, as well as the general director of Kirovles Vyacheslav Opalev, he sold more than 10 thousand cubic meters. m of forest products at a reduced price. A pre-investigation audit in December 2010 estimated the damage to the budget of the Kirov region at 1.3 million rubles. The final estimate of damage exceeded 16 million rubles.
Lawyers for Alexei Navalny believe that the investigation in the case used an unlawful, broad interpretation of Art. 160 of the Criminal Code of Russia (“misappropriation or embezzlement”). There are no signs of theft in the incriminated actions:
Illegality (timber products were supplied in accordance with the contract)
Free of charge (forest products were paid according to the contract)
Causing damage to the owner (neither in 2009 nor later did the Department of State Property of the Kirov Region declare that damage was caused to him as the owner)
Selfish purpose (neither Navalny nor Officers received income from these operations)
In addition, according to the defense, the purpose of the trial was to “obstruct the social and political activities of Mr. Navalny.”
During the investigation of the case and trial Alexey Navalny continued to lead political activity. Since December 2011, he took part in protest rallies against the falsification of the State Duma election results. He was twice subjected to administrative arrests for 15 days for disobedience to police officers. In October 2012, he was elected to the Opposition Coordination Council (CCO), which ceased to exist a year later due to disagreements among the participants. On September 8, 2013, the politician took 2nd place in the Moscow mayoral elections, gaining 27.24% of the votes against Sergei Sobyanin’s 51.37%. Since November 17, 2013, Mr. Navalny has been the head of the central council political party progress.
Last December, Alexey Navalny announced his intention to take part in the Russian presidential elections, which are scheduled to take place in March 2018. On February 4 of this year, he opened the 1st election headquarters in St. Petersburg. The politician himself believes that the new trial of the case is an illegal attempt to prevent him from reaching the elections. According to the law, Russians who have been sentenced to imprisonment for committing grave and (or) especially grave crimes and who have an unexpunged and outstanding criminal record on election day cannot be elected.
Kommersant FM correspondent Vladimir Rasulov from the Leninsky District Court of Kirov: “Navalny’s last word was partly similar to a political slogan, a manifesto. He partially recalled that this was his seventh final word and the second on the Kirovles case. Last time he uttered the last word in this same room. The oppositionist said that no matter what the verdict is, guilty or acquittal, and he asked for himself, naturally, acquittal, his election campaign will continue.”
On May 10, 2011, the Investigative Committee opened a criminal case against Alexei Navalny under Art. 165 of the Criminal Code (“causing property damage by deception or abuse of trust”). Another person involved was an entrepreneur, CEO company Vyatka Forestry Company LLC Petr Ofitserov.
On April 10, 2012, the case was completed due to the lack of evidence of a crime, but on May 29 it was resumed by order of the leadership of the Investigative Committee.
On July 18, 2013, the Leninsky District Court of Kirov found Navalny and Ofitserov guilty and sentenced them to 5 and 4 years in prison, respectively. On October 16, the real sentence was changed to suspended.
On February 23, 2016, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) recognized a violation of the right of Alexei Navalny and Pyotr Ofitserov to fair trial in the Kirovles case. In their favor, the ECHR recovered €87 thousand from Russia. Moreover, the court did not find any political background in the Kirovles case.
On November 16, 2016, the Supreme Court, at the request of the defense, overturned the verdict in the Kirovles case, sending the case for retrial “due to newly discovered circumstances.”
On January 31, 2017, bailiffs took the politician from the office of the Anti-Corruption Foundation in the capital for forced delivery to the next hearing in the Kirov Court.
Mark Urnov, political scientist, professor at the National Research University Higher School of Economics: “The court’s decision will not cause a public outcry, since the verdict is quite expected. Those who supported him will remain with him, those who did not support him will continue to behave in the same spirit. And the problem of his real electability to the presidential post does not depend on how and who treats him. It is important whether he will have good access to central television channels in the coming years. But he won't be there. So he can take part in the elections, he can play some role in them, but he has absolutely no chance of even making it to the second round.”
Lyudmila Alekseeva, head of the Moscow Helsinki Group: “I won’t say anything about the seriousness of the consequences for Russia, as well as for Navalny himself, time will tell. But if the repeated conviction occurred due to the need to deprive him of the right to participate in the upcoming presidential elections in Russia, then it is in vain. And it’s not that manipulating this is bad, it’s just that elections will become boring as a result. People are very tired of all these Zhirinovskys, Zyuganovs and other regulars of the presidential race.”
Irina Khakamada, member of the Russian Presidential Council for the Development of Civil Society and Human Rights: “Today’s court decision on Navalny, of course, can spur the world community to adopt a new analogue of the “Magnitsky list.” Anything can happen here. But no one cares about this; no one pays attention to all the calls of European organizations for the protection of human rights. Business circles in the West are more pragmatic; they have long ago given up on democracy in Russia; they want to have a stable, pragmatic partner like China in Russia. Therefore, nothing new will happen, and if something happens, it will not be influential for Russia.”
Artem Tarasov, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Institute of Innovation, the first legal Soviet millionaire: “The consequences for Navalny will be simple - he will not be able to participate in the presidential elections. And, most likely, he will not be able to appeal the verdict again. Last time he succeeded because there were obvious procedural violations, which the ECHR pointed out. Now, apparently, the court has eliminated these violations and the European court will have no reason to interfere. Therefore, even though Navalny is showing off and cheerfully asserting that he will appeal everything, I don’t really believe in a positive result for him. Most likely, there will be no consequences for the country, and they are not needed. Just as there was no power of the people called democracy in it, there still isn’t.”
Konstantin Simonov, director of the National Energy Security Fund: “The main consequence is that at the moment Navalny will not be able to take part in the presidential election race. This key moment and most importantly, for the sake of what all this was started. There is no talk of his complete isolation and elimination from the political process yet. Moreover, if he is given a real sentence and sent to prison, this could raise his political significance. New curator domestic policy Kiriyenko, it seems to me, has not yet made a final decision, he is sitting and thinking about what to do, what scenario to follow, whether Navalny is needed or not in the elections.”
“After all, the main task of the Kremlin now will be to falsify voter turnout,” Navalny said.
Sobchak made an offer to Navalny to become her confidant in the 2018 elections
Due to the Central Election Commission’s refusal to allow Navalny to participate in the elections, Ksenia Sobchak invited the founder of the Anti-Corruption Foundation to become her confidant. to run for president.
Journalist Ksenia Sobchak wrote on her Instagram that she considers it “a monstrous injustice and another mistake by the authorities” that the founder of the Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK) Alexei Navalny was not allowed to participate in the upcoming presidential elections and invited the politician to become her confidant.
“I understand how hurtful and difficult it is for Alexey now, but the common cause is more important. Therefore, I continue to call on all democratic opposition forces to unite. And if I register, I propose that Alexei Navalny become my confidant,” noted.
The Russian presidential elections will take place on March 18, 2018. More than 30 people declared their intention to participate in them, including the current President of Russia Vladimir Putin, Sobchak, Zhirinovsky and others ().
Well-known opposition leader Alexei Navalny announced on Tuesday, December 13, his intention to run for president of the Russian Federation in the 2018 elections. “I thought for a long time whether I should take part in them. I came to the conclusion that yes, I will take part in the fight for the post of president of Russia,” Navalny says in a video dedicated to his candidacy. However, there is an equally important question: will the opposition politician retain the right to be elected? At the moment, Navalny has it, but the ongoing proceedings in the Kirovles case leave this right in question.
Alexey Navalny regained the opportunity to participate in the elections as a candidate less than a month ago. On November 16, the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation, having taken note of the verdict of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), overturned the lower court's decision in the Kirovles case and sent the case for a new trial.
The case that did not want to be initiated
The story around Kirovles began back in 2009. Then the company of entrepreneur Peter Ofitserov entered into a contract with the state enterprise Kirovles for the supply of forest products. Ofitserov’s company paid 15.5 million rubles for the products and subsequently resold them to buyers for 17 million rubles. Soon law enforcement agencies began an investigation on suspicion of theft in a state-owned company. Navalny at that time was an adviser to the governor of the Kirov region on a voluntary basis and allegedly organized the deal.
In 2010, local investigators reported that Navalny’s investigation did not reveal any crime. This was also confirmed by the district investigative department. However, in May 2011, the case was opened, but in April 2012 it was discontinued against both Navalny and Ofitserov “for lack of evidence of a crime.” At the same time, Navalny, actively participating in rallies, turned from a popular blogger into one of the leaders of the protest movement in Russia.
In July 2012, the main department of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation took the case under investigation, and by the end of the month the oppositionist was charged with “theft of someone else’s property on an especially large scale.” A year later, the Leninsky District Court of Kirov found Navalny and Ofitserov guilty, sentencing them to five and four years in prison, respectively. In October 2013, the punishment was replaced with suspended sentences.
Russian citizens sentenced to imprisonment for committing a serious crime cannot run for deputy or presidency if their conviction has not been expunged for another 10 years after that. Thus, Kirovles blocked Navalny’s path to participating in elections for years to come.
"Arbitrary interpretation of the law to the detriment" of Navalny and Ofitserov
The turning point was the February decision of the ECHR, which upheld the appeals of Navalny and Ofitserov. The court found that they were found guilty of "acts indistinguishable from ordinary commercial intermediary activities." “The criminal law was subject to arbitrary and unpredictable interpretation to the detriment of the applicants (Navalny and Ofitserov. - Ed.), which led to a clearly unreasonable outcome of the trial,” stated the ECHR ruling.
The ECHR found Navalny and Ofitserov’s complaints about persecution for political reasons to be “at least unsubstantiated.” And the fact that Russian authorities ignored them “only increased fears that real reasons The criminal prosecution and conviction of the applicants were of a political nature." Following this verdict, the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation sent the case for review.
Context
What about the conviction in the Yves Rocher case?
Alexei Navalny also has an outstanding criminal record in the Yves Rocher criminal case - in December 2014 he was sentenced to 3.5 years of probation. The EU Foreign Office called the verdict “politically motivated,” and the Navalny brothers (Oleg Navalny received a real prison term in this case. - Ed.) filed a complaint with the ECHR. But even if the appeal does not have time to be promptly considered, in the Yves Rocher case the oppositionist was accused of fraud and legalization of funds received, and this is an article of medium gravity and does not imply restrictions for the convicted person to participate in elections.
Presidential candidate in the dock
The renewed proceedings in the Kirovles case continue to pose a threat to the participation of opposition politicians in the 2018 presidential elections. But, as observers note, now, after Navalny’s statement, the consideration of this case is acquiring political significance. “Now it’s not just Navalny who is being tried, but Russian presidential candidate Navalny, and this is a big difference,” noted political scientist Gleb Pavlovsky on the Internet platform The Question.
The Kirovsky District Court issued a verdict in the case of Alexei Navalny and Pyotr Ofitserov. The guilty verdict is five years of suspended imprisonment.
It is worth recalling that the review of the case itself was related to the decision of the European Court of Human Rights, where Navalny appealed. The ECHR did not assess the fact of theft itself, but noted that “human rights were violated” in relation to Navalny.
Since, within the framework of Russian legislation, the decisions of the ECHR are now of a recommendatory nature, then taking into account these very “recommendations”, a review of the Kirovles case was initiated.
It is worth recalling that in 2008, during the first trial, as now, Alexey Navalny and Pyotr Ofitserov were accused of causing losses to a Kirov enterprise in the amount of 16 million rubles.
At the same time, the oppositionist has already stated several times that the court is organized in such a way and in such a format to prevent him from running for president of the Russian Federation. However, he, like Pyotr Ofitserov, made attempts to “slow down” the process by their own systematic failure to appear. When they are forced into the courthouse, with the help of bailiffs.
Navalny himself after the verdict stated- despite the suspended sentence, he will still run for president.
"We will continue our campaign and fight for the best Russia despite this verdict dictated from the Kremlin. We do not recognize it and will cancel it,” he wrote.
This is the kind of lawyer we have - an expert in the law and a “respecter of the law”, demanding that everyone around him obey it - except himself.
But how is it different from then from the President of the Gambia - who lost the elections and said that he would still be president because that’s what he wants. And, they say, the elections were dishonest. Let us remember that he was “knocked down” by the entry of the armies of neighboring states - after which he took the entire treasury and left to live in luxury in exile.
“Based on the actual circumstances of each candidate, during the designated specific election campaign, each candidate will be treated based on the requirements of the law,” she told the media CEC Secretary Maya Grishina.
“In general, it will be interesting to see how the conflict is resolved: the election law states that Navalny will lose the right to run for president (after the verdict comes into force), the Constitution says the opposite,” the liberal media sneer.
However, even they understand that laws exist in order to correct the “direct effect” of the Constitution. For example, according to the Constitution, a person has the right to housing and freedom to march - but the law restricts the holding of rallies on the territory of a nuclear power plant or part of the Strategic Missile Forces, as well as the construction of a house on Krasnaya Square or in the middle of a cemetery.
By the way, in insider telegram channel they write that " good people from PARNAS they said that they had already started calling Kasyanov and congratulating him as “the new single candidate from the opposition.” “They say they called Kasyanov - he’s so proud, he says, ‘I didn’t say that I would run, but many are already congratulating him,’” they add.
“Sources in PARNAS confirm that MikhMikh is still considering running in the elections as a single opposition candidate from the pro-Western liberal electorate. Despite all the anti-ratings. They say that an alliance with Yavlinsky is being discussed “as always,” but Kasyanov’s conditions “for now and after” are too much for Grigory tough," sources say.
“Allegedly, in the backstage conversation of the leadership (would it be clear if it was MikhMikh himself or Pelevina’s head?) it was already said: “That’s it, Navalny has been written off, you can bargain with him over the audience without interfering,” they add.
“Gazeta.Ru” writes here that Kasyanov will allegedly become the only opposition candidate in the presidential elections after Navalny’s verdict. They refer to a “source close to opposition parties.” Kasyanov himself said that SO far there is no solution,” sounds in the Republic broadcast.
Upon the announcement of the verdict, Alexey Navalny is again indignant that “the verdict is the same.” Although, what he expected, even if the ECHR has no claims on the merits of the charges, is not very clear.
“All the witnesses were heard again, many of whom directly said that they considered the agreement between the accused and Kirovles to be unprofitable and inconsistent with the interests of the enterprise. In particular, the deputy director of Kirovles spoke on this matter,” recalled Pravda.ru lawyer Ilya Remeslo.
“At least such a detail betrays the crime committed: they used an encrypted communication with their accomplice, Officerov, spoke allegorically about everything, hid everything, etc. Why do this if we're talking about about the usual economic activity? And the way Navalny tried to get rid of it... His lawyer made demands to exclude the results of the wiretapping from the case materials. They understood everything perfectly. And now they understand what they were doing at that moment, that they were committing theft,” he emphasized.
It is also significant that all these circus somersaults of Alexei Navalny around Kirovles and the trial in this case caused a negative reaction even in the opposition environment.
For example, one of the oppositionists, Igor Mandarinov on your page in social network commented on the situation like this: “No one has had any illusions about the personality of Navalny’s grabber for a long time; he is supported by the “victims” only by GazpromEcho and a number of comrades who simply want to be there in the event of his “victory”, if anything, just fix it.
There are a dime a dozen of these “Rotenberg-Navalnys” in every ministry, region, village, city, and everyone vomits as much as they can, and so does the blogger. That’s the whole song here. When you see a blogger's fan, just ask two questions:1. Baturin would have gotten the development of all of Moscow if her husband hadn’t been the mayor and2. Would a Navalny thief get the right to be a thief if he weren’t under the roof of the whites? By mail it’s the same thing, the blogger’s lining became only under the patronage of his brother, there’s an even worse conspiracy there, but that’s a separate song, but whatever you sing, there’s only one refrain - he’s a thief and in the opposition he is also a thief and it’s a pity that some people include him among us, don’t, this is a stinking pimple on the body of the opposition and its SHAME!”
At the same time, lawyers remind how much the courts “give” ordinary Russian citizens according to the same 4 articles 160 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.
For example, on September 6, 2011, the Kharabalinsky District Court of the Astrakhan Region sentenced G.I. Tychinin, who stole sheep worth a total of one million 188 thousand rubles. He was sentenced to five years in prison to be served in a general regime correctional colony, with a further restriction of freedom for a period of 1 year. For those in doubt, here is the link.
Further. A certain lieutenant with the iconic surname Kasyanov stole food belonging to military unit number 3, causing damage to the named unit in the total amount of 1,211,349 rubles 49 kopecks. By the verdict of the Bezrechnensky Garrison Military Court of May 7, 2010, he was found guilty under Part 4 of Article 160 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation and sentenced to six years in a general regime correctional colony with a fine. Here is also a link.
In the case of Navalny, we are talking about amounts fifteen times (!!!) higher than the price of sheep stolen by a poor shepherd, and the same canned food stolen by a lieutenant. The article is the same, the damage is many times greater, and Navalny’s sentence is suspended...
By the way, sarcastic statements are very funny Navalny's chief of staff in your telegram channel. “Why are analysts silent? Here is the verdict on Kirovles-2, which is copied verbatim from the verdict on Kirovles-1... And it is clear that this verdict finally proves that Navalny is a Kremlin project, but which tower exactly?
The most interesting thing is that now, with a suspended sentence, Alexei Navalny will not be able to officially register as a presidential candidate. However, according to Leonid Volkov, several million rubles have already been collected for the campaign, for which it is now completely unnecessary to report in any form. In fact, the money “donated for elections” turned out to be contributions “for a good life.”
In principle, such a scheme is not new for Navalny. Because there are still a lot of questions about the pre-election finances of Navalny’s headquarters during the Moscow mayoral elections. The issues are so serious that some of the oppositionist’s comrades rushed to move to London following the results of the campaign, and in Russia representatives of law enforcement agencies are eagerly awaiting them.
Let us note that Pravda.Ru wrote in early December: as soon as Navalny announced his presidential ambitions, press secretary of the Russian President Dmitry Peskov reminded that those found guilty in criminal cases cannot participate in presidential elections.
“We would also like to remind you that Alexei Navalny’s “asset” includes another suspended sentence: three and a half years in the Yves Rocher case, the verdict on which was rendered in December 2014 by the Zamoskvoretsky Court of Moscow, which reclassified the crimes charged against the defendants as committed in the sphere of entrepreneurial activity", the journalists add.
“Found Navalny guilty and sentence him to five years probation and a fine of 500 thousand rubles,” the judge announced the verdict.
Thus, Navalny and Ofitserov were repeatedly found guilty of committing crimes under Part 3 of Article 33, Part 4 of Article 160 (“Organizing the embezzlement of other people’s property on an especially large scale”) and Part 5 of Article 33, Part 4 of Article 160 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (“Organization of embezzlement of other people’s property on an especially large scale”) and Part 5 of Article 33, Part 4 of Article 160 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (“Organization of embezzlement of other people’s property on an especially large scale”) Complicity in embezzling someone else's property on an especially large scale"), respectively.
Navalny was also appointed probation lasting 1.5 years - the court counted 3.5 years for the first sentence.
“We do not agree with this verdict; it completely repeated the verdict following the first consideration of this case. We will appeal it. We do not recognize this verdict, it will be canceled, I will participate in the elections. Right now I’m participating in the election campaign,” said Alexei Navalny.
Lawyer of the Moscow Bar Association Timur Marshani told RT that the oppositionist will not be able to run for president until the sentence is overturned after it comes into force.
“At the moment, Navalny cannot run for president because the verdict has not yet entered into legal force. The law provides that if convicted under an article for a serious or especially serious crime, he cannot run or be elected to the presidency until his criminal record is cleared and expunged. When, after 10 years, his criminal record is cleared and expunged, he will be able to run for president. The court confirmed the sentence that had been imposed earlier. He will serve a suspended sentence for five years, according to the law, he must wait another five years, in accordance with the Criminal Code, until the criminal record is expunged, if it is expunged, and after 10 years, according to the law on presidential elections (clause 5.2 of Article 3), when it is expunged , he will be able to run,” said Timur Marshani.
The oppositionist himself noted that this decision will not affect his ability to participate in the presidential campaign, since she expects the verdict to be overturned.
“We will overturn this verdict in the ECHR and the Supreme Court even before the start of the official campaign. In any case, according to the Constitution, any person who is not in prison has the right to participate in elections,” Navalny said.
The Leninsky Court of Kirov already issued a guilty verdict in the Kirovles case against Navalny and Ofitserov in July 2013. Then the court found that Navalny and Ofitserov had stolen 10 thousand cubic meters of forest products from the enterprise with a total value of 16 million rubles. The accused were taken into custody, but released the next day on their own recognizance until the verdict came into force. Later, the sentence was changed to a suspended sentence and a fine of 500 thousand rubles.
The former general director of the Kirovles company, Vyacheslav Opalev, who testified against Navalny and Ofitserov, was convicted in a special manner for having entered into a deal with the investigation.
In February 2016, the European Court of Human Rights upheld the complaint of the lawyers of Navalny and Ofitserov, who objected to the violation of the right to a fair trial. Then the ECHR ruled that the Russian court found the defendants guilty of a crime the elements of which were indistinguishable from legitimate business activity, which was regarded by the Strasbourg court as an arbitrary interpretation of the law.
The Strasbourg court did not consider the Russian side's appeal against this decision. The ECHR also ruled that the Russian authorities must pay Navalny and Ofitserov more than €80 thousand in compensation.
In November 2016, the presidium Supreme Court The Russian Federation overturned the verdict in the Kirovles case at the request of the chairman of the court to resume proceedings in this case due to the decision of the ECHR. The proceedings were resumed in the Leninsky Court of Kirov in December 2016.
Alexei Navalny was forcibly brought to court by bailiffs on February 1 due to failure to appear at previous hearings. At the same time, Judge Vtyurin chose a preventive measure for Navalny and Ofitserov in the form of a written undertaking not to leave until February 10, later allowing them to leave the city of Kirov until the verdict was announced.
The prosecution demanded a sentence of five years of suspended imprisonment for Alexei Navalny and four years of suspended imprisonment for Ofitserov, as well as a fine of 500 thousand rubles. for each.
The defense of Navalny and Ofitserov asked for an acquittal, pointing out the absence of elements and events of the crime. Lawyer Olga Mikhailova said that in the case there are no signs of theft of Kirovles property.
