Valery Brinikh
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July 5, 2016

Hello!

Yesterday, the latest hearing in my court case took place. It began at 2:15 p.m.

First, Judge Vitaly Galagan read out the findings of the forensic handwriting analysis of signatures made, allegedly, by Mugdin Guchetl, a prosecution witness from the village of Gabukay, who testified at the hearing before last that he had not signed the written record of the testimony he gave to the police investigator. Instead, at the investigator’s request, he had signed blank sheets of paper in the right places. As expected, the signatures were deemed authentic, although there had been the possibility the investigator had forged not only the interrogation records but also the signatures of witnesses.

The judge then returned to my deferred motion to rule the Teuchezhsky District Council an illegitimate injured party. We had requested the prosecution present written grounds for its legal position, as the prosecutors had objected to granting my motion, arguing that the Teuchezhsky District Council was a legitimate injured party.

The prosecution outdid itself, submitting in writing not only its own objections to granting the motion but also those of the so-called injured party. Surprisingly, the arguments made by district council head Khachmamuk and state prosecutors Shvetsov and Orlova were identical down to the details. Someone probably guided their hands from on high as they scribbled away. But, as the saying goes, paper cannot blush.

The point of their objections was so simple and straightforward that it was completely untethered from the case, leading the reader off into the boundless expanses of the fight against terrorism and extremism.

It transpires that “the leading role in the fighting terrorism and extremism has been assigned to the district council,” while my article “has provoked extremist sentiments in society and has had a negative impact on the work of the Teuchezhsky District Council in preventing extremism.”

Talk about the perpetrator blaming the victim, and without establishing any causal link between my article “The Silence of the Lambs” and the work of the Teuchezhsky District Council in preventing terrorism and extremism!

Attempting to demonstrate the absence of logic and common sense in the objections raised by the injured party and the prosecutors, I reminded the court that the case files contained the January 22, 2015, ruling by the Maykop City Court, which has entered into force, rejecting the Teuchezhsky District Council’s lawsuit against me, in my capacity as author of the article “The Silence of the Lambs,” by way of defending its professional reputation. I also pointed out that the article contains no criticism of the Teuchezhsky District Council’s work in general (it is not even mentioned in the article) nor, in particular, of its work in the field of extremism prevention.

In addition, the district council’s authority extends only to events that have occurred within the district itself, while the article was published on the World Wide Web. The events covered in the article (the actions of the Kievo-Zhuraki Agrobusiness hog breeding facility, the inaction of authorities at all levels in dealing with the Teuchezhsky District’s environmental problems, and my meetings with local residents) in no way touch on the Teuchezhsky District Council’s authority in combating terrorism and extremism.

After hearing all this, Judge Vitaly Galagan smiled cutely and retired to chambers at 2:50 p.m. As it turned out, he spent two and a half long hours in there. What could he have been doing all that time? It would be one thing if at least he had been consulting with smart folk on how to reasonably reject my motion. I realize it is illegal, but rehashing arguments that have nothing whatsoever to do with our case as grounds for rejecting my motion is not only illegal but also stupid. Basically, as they say in such instances, the mountain has brought forth a mouse.

According to the prosecution and Judge Galagan, who concurred with their arguments, the article “The Silence of the Lambs,” which I wrote in Maykop and published on the Internet, somehow diminished the vigilant work of the Teuchezhsky District Council in preventing extremism in the Teuchezhsky District, thus damaging the council’s professional reputation. In such cases, the saying goes, children are awfully sensitive. The district’s principle extremism preventer has been turned into a crybaby. Or, on the contrary, has the prosecution designated it the crybaby given the lack of actual injured parties?

As I listened to the prosecution’s counterarguments, I realized why our local councils take such bad care of local residents, why they take such bad care of roads, hot and cold running water, medical care and education, why everything is so bad: because our local authorities have bigger fish to fry. They have all left for the front to combat terrorism and extremism, and until they defeat the hydra of counter-revolution, the people will just have to suffer. And anyone who moans and groans and criticizes the authorities can be charged with violating Article 282 of the Russian Federal Criminal Code.

I want to give one more piece of sage advice to Russian judges. Lubricate the hinges of the doors to your chambers. Otherwise, the damn things squeak, and those of us sitting in the courtroom get all kinds of funny ideas about the secrecy of judicial deliberations being violated. Is their secrecy being violated, or is it just a draught of wind playing tricks with the door?

The next round in this exercise in umpiring is scheduled for today, July 5, at 10:00 a.m.

Translated by the Russian Reader. Read all my previous posts on Valery Brinikh’s extremism case.