Since the introduction of responsibility for discrediting the army, the courts have received more than 600 materials under Article 20.3.3 of the Administrative Code. Most of these cases are in the Kaliningrad region, St. Petersburg and the Crimea, it follows from the data of the GAS "Justice" *
For the period of a little more than a month since the introduction of administrative responsibility for discrediting the Armed Forces of Russia, 610 cases have been submitted to the courts under the relevant article of the Administrative Code, it follows from the statistics of the GAS "Justice" for the period from March 4 to April 11, which was analyzed by RBC. Of these, at least 334 cases were ordered by the courts to impose an administrative penalty, three were discontinued, and another 176 cases have not yet been considered. At the same time, 80 cases of discrediting, decisions on which were made, have already been appealed.
Article 20.3.3 appeared in the Code of Administrative Offences on March 4, after Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a law on punishment for knowingly false information about the actions of the Russian armed forces. If discrediting is accompanied by calls for illegal actions and poses a threat to public safety, then a fine of 50 thousand to 100 thousand rubles is provided for citizens. For the distribution of fakes without appeals, the fine is less - from 30 thousand to 50 thousand rubles.
The Kaliningrad Region has become the leading region in the number of cases of discrediting the armed forces: according to the GAS "Justice", 77 administrative cases have been submitted to the courts of the region since March 4. The press service of the Kaliningrad Regional Court informed RBC that on the morning of April 11, there were 64 materials under Article 20.3.3, most of which (53 cases) had already been considered with decisions on bringing persons to administrative responsibility. The discrepancy in statistics can be explained by the intensity of the receipt of cases: materials could arrive during the day, they noted.
The second largest number of cases was St. Petersburg. As of April 11, there were 55 administrative cases in the city courts, of which 33 were considered. A little less - 37 cases under Article 20.3.3 of the Administrative Code - were submitted to the courts of Crimea. The Amur Region (27 cases), Perm Krai (26 cases), Yaroslavl (21 cases) and Kostroma (19) regions also entered the top ten leading subjects in terms of the number of discredited cases received.
The courts of the Yaroslavl region for the period from March 4 to April 11 considered 16 cases under Article 20.3.3 of the Administrative Code, the press service of the regional court told RBC, without specifying the total number of cases received. They noted that all those who were held in these cases were found guilty, each of them was fined 30 thousand rubles. "Two of these persons were also subjected to administrative punishment in the form of arrest for a period of 10 days, one for committing minor hooliganism (Part 1 of Article 20.1 of the Administrative Code), the second for violating the established procedure for organizing a public event (part 2 of Article 20.2 of the Administrative Code)," the court's press service added.
The press service of the Amur Regional Court informed RBC that from March 4 to April 14 (three days longer than the period under consideration by RBC), 55 cases of administrative offenses under Article 20.3.3 of the Administrative Code were received by the courts of the Amur Region.
According to the data of the GAS "Justice", since the introduction of liability for discrediting, not a single case under this article has been considered in the courts of several regions. In particular, these are the Chechen Republic, Ingushetia, Dagestan, North Ossetia, the Republic of Tyva.
Moscow is not taken into account in the statistics, there is no information about the number of cases received on the website of the courts of Moscow. RBC sent a request to the press service of the Moscow City Court.
Administrative cases under Article 20.3.3 of the Administrative Code were submitted to the courts on average 115 materials per week. The most cases at the moment were in the period from March 14 to March 20 - then there were 143 of them.
For the recently introduced norm, such a number of cases is a lot, Bulat Tugutov, head of the administrative and criminal law practice of the law firm Nadmitov, Ivanov and Partners, told RBC.
At the same time, the share of discrediting cases in the total volume of administrative offenses looks insignificant - in the first half of 2021 (the latest data from the judicial department), the courts considered more than 4.5 million cases, said lawyer Alexander Peredruk.
According to Peredruk, the norm does not contain a clear formulation of discrediting the armed forces, which makes the use unpredictable. For example, on April 4, the Moscow police drew up a report on a picketer who was holding a poster with a quote by Leo Tolstoy, in March a resident of Novosibirsk was fined for an uncoordinated protest action with a poster on which there was a quote from the trilogy "Deeds and Speeches" by Victor Hugo.
Courts are rapidly reviewing materials on this article, we can talk about the conveyor nature of trials, says Stanislav Seleznev, senior partner of the Network Freedoms project.
"The evaluation of the statement requires the involvement of a person with special knowledge, an expert linguist. The courts are satisfied with a personal assessment of the text or publication from the employee who drew up the protocol," Seleznev told RBC.
According to Seleznev, most often an article about discrediting is attracted for anti-war posters - more than 140 cases, for publications on social networks - more than 100, as well as for inscriptions on clothes, distribution of leaflets.
Since March 4, a number of politicians have been fined for discrediting the armed forces. Three protocols under Article 20.3.3 of the Administrative Code were drawn up in Yekaterinburg for Evgeny Roizman. In early April, the Gagarin Court of Moscow fined 150 thousand rubles. the heads of two districts of the capital - Elena Rusakova (Gagarin) and Gordey Nefedov (Lomonosovsky).
Criminal liability is also provided for fakes about the armed forces (Article 207.3 of the Criminal Code). Criminal cases were initiated against blogger Veronika Belotserkovskaya, journalist Alexander Nevzorov, as well as Ukrainian TV presenter Dmitry Gordon . In Gordon's actions, the UK saw a violation of two more articles of the Criminal Code - on public calls to unleash an aggressive war and actions aimed at inciting hatred or enmity on the grounds of nationality (Part 2 of Article 354, paragraph "b" of Part 2 of Article 282 of the Criminal Code).
Two criminal cases for fakes about the army were initiated in the Tomsk region: one against a resident of Seversk, the second against a resident of Tomsk, who published a post containing "deliberately false information that he allegedly received from eyewitnesses from the places of events about the participation of Russian troops in Ukraine."
At the end of March, the Presnensky Court of Moscow arrested the first person involved in a criminal case on the dissemination of fakes about the country's armed forces. He became a technician of the reserve control point of the metropolitan Central Office of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Sergey Klokov. On April 11, the Basmanny Court of Moscow detained a native of Colombia, Giraldo Saray Alberto Enrique.
Author: Elizaveta Lamova
