Lemmy Kilmister vs. Vladimir Putin

Mother of Man Accused in Penza Case Files Complaint Against Lawyer Mikhail Grigoryan, Who Concealed Son’s Torture from Her
Mediazona
May 14, 2018

Yelena Bogatova, mother of antifascist Ilya Shakursky, one of the young men accused in the so-called Penza-Petersburg “terrorism” case (aka The Network case) has filed a complaint against attorney Mikhail Grigoryan with the Moscow Bar Association and the Penza Bar Association. Mediazona has a copy of the complaint in its possession. In the complaint, Ms. Bogatova reports that, in October 2017, she signed an agreement with Mr. Grigoryan. According to the agreement, he agreed to defend her son, for which she paid him ₽100,000 [approx. €1,360]. According to Ms. Bogatova, over the six months during which the investigation of the Penza case was underway, Mr. Grigoryan “grossly violated the basic principles of attorney ethics.”

Thus, Mr. Grigoryan did not convey to Ms. Bogatova her son’s account of how security services officers tortured him with electrical shocks. Mr. Grigoryan also convinced Mr. Shakursky he must confess his involvement in a “terrorist community,” thus depriving him of professional services.

In addition, without obtaining Ms. Bogatova and her son’s consent, Mr. Grigorayn “used the information confided to him and interpreted it in an unethical manner,” acted against Mr. Shakursky’s will, and “made public statements that his client’s guilt had been proven, despite his denial of guilt.”

Mikhail Grigoryan, sporting a leather jacket and a Motorhead t-shirt against the backdrop of a Vladimir Putin calendar. Photo courtesy of Mr. Grigoryan’s VK page and Mediazona

Mr. Grigoryan, for example, gave an interview to the BBC’s Russian Service in which he discussed the “serious set of evidence” the case investigators had assembled against the accused young antifascists.

“According to Grigoryan, during the investigation, FSB officers showed him a large ‘tome,’ a methodology that had, allegedly, been confiscated from one of the accused, describing the rules for recruiting new group members,” wrote BBC reporters Olga Prosvirova and Oksana Chizh in the article.

“Believe me, it was not written by twentysomething young men. I think it was drafted somewhere in the depths of the secret services. Not our secret services, of course. I’ll leave the rest to your imagination,” they quoted Mr. Grigoryan as saying.

Mr. Grigoryan also was interviewed by Russian TV channel NTV, excerpts of which were used in their documentary film on the Penza case. In the interview, Mr. Grigoryan claims his client “was well aware” he was involved in a terrorist community.

“Why were they learning to shoot firearms? Here there seems to be awareness of what they were doing. Can we say they were playing cops and robbers? I don’t think these are little kids. They are not Young Pioneers. They went out to practice. Why were they learning to shoot firearms?” Mr. Grigoryan told NTV reporters.

As Ms. Bogatova wrote in her complaint, she expected Mr. Grigoryan to defend her son, not act as his accuser. She asked the bar associations to take disciplinary measures against Mr. Grigoryan.

The FSB launched an investigation into the “The Network terrorist community” in October 2017. Most of the young men who have been accused and arrested in the case are antifascists and anarchists. According to the FSB, the members of the alleged community were planning terrorist attacks during the March 2018 presidential election and this summer’s FIFA World Cup in order to “sway the masses and further destabilize the political situation” in Russia, ultimately inciting an armed uprising.

Yegor Zorin, Ilya Shakursky, Vasily Kuksov, Dmitry Pchelintsev, and Andrei Chernov were detained last autumn in Penza and remanded in custody. Arman Sagynbayev was apprehended in Petersburg and transferred to the remand prison in Penza.

Viktor Filinkov and Igor Shishkin were apprehended and remanded in custody in the same case this past January in Petersburg. In April, a third Petersburger, Yuli Boyarshinov, was charged in the case.

Pchelintsev, Shakursky, and Filinkov have testified FSB officers tortured them, demanding they confess to the charges against them.

Translated by the Russian Reader

***************

What you can do to support the Penza and Petersburg antifascists and anarchists tortured and imprisoned by the FSB

• Donate money to the Anarchist Black Cross via PayPal (abc-msk@riseup.net) and make sure to specify that your donation is earmarked for “Rupression.”
• Spread the word about The Network Case aka the Penza-Petersburg “Terrorism Case.” You can find more information about the case and in=depth articles translated into English on this website (see below), rupression.com, and openDemocracyRussia.
• Organize solidarity events where you live to raise money and drawn attention to the plight of the tortured Penza and Petersburg antifascists. Go to the website It’s Going Down to find downloadable, printable posters and flyers. You can also read more about the case there.
• If you have the time and means to design, produce, and sell solidarity merch, please write to rupression@protonmail.com.
• Write letters and postcards to the prisoners. Letters and postcards must be written in Russian or translated into Russian. You will find the addresses of the prisoners here.
• Design a solidarity postcard that can be printed out and used by others to send messages of support to the prisoners. Send your ideas to rupression@protonmail.com.
• Write letters of support to the prisoners’ loved ones via rupression@protonmail.com.
• Translate the articles and information at rupression.com and this website into languages other than Russian and English, and publish your translations on social media and your own websites and blogs.
• If you know someone famous, ask them to record a solidarity video, write an op-ed piece for a mainstream newspaper or write letters to the prisoners.
• If you know someone who is a print, internet, TV or radio journalist, encourage them to write an article or broadcast a report about the case. Write to rupression@protonmail.com or the email listed on this website, and we will be happy to arrange interviews and provide additional information. It is extremely important this case break into the mainstream media both in Russia and abroad. Despite their apparent brashness, the FSB and their ilk do not like publicity. The more publicity the case gets, the safer our comrades will be in remand prison from violence at the hands of prison stooges and more torture at the hands of the FSB, and the more likely the Russian authorities will be likely to drop the case altogether or release the defendants for time served if the case ever does go to trial. Why? Because the case is a complete frame-up, based on testimony obtained under torture. When the complaints filed by the accused reach the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg and are ultimately ajudicated, the Russian government will be forced to pay heavy fines for its cruel mockery of justice.

***************

If you have not been following the Penza-Petersburg “terrorism” case and other cases involving frame-ups, torture, and violent intimidation by the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) and other arms of the Russian police state, read and repost the recent articles the Russian Reader has translated and published on these subjects.

• “Lemmy Kilmister vs. Vladimir Putin,” 19 May 2018
• “Brazil,” 18 May 2018
• “This Is What Antifascism Looks Like,” 13 May 2018
• “May Day in Petersburg: ‘Your Torture Won’t Kill Our Ideas,’” 2 May 2018
• “Riot Cops Raid Punk Rock in Barnaul: ‘Freaks, Not Patriots,” 29 April 2018
• “Hug Your Son and We’ll Open Fire,” 27 April 2018
• “Denis Lebedev’s Suicide Note,” 26 April 2018
• “‘Are You a Bitch Yet?’ FSB Makes New Threats to Framed and Tortured Antifascist Viktor Filinkov,” 26 April 2018
• “Suicide Invoice,” 25 April 2018
• “Zoya Svetova: Interview with Petersburg Public Monitoring Commission Members Yana Teplitskaya and Yekaterina Kosarevskaya,” 23 April 2018
• “TV Party Tonight!” 21 April 2018
• “Valery Pshenichny: Tortured, Then Murdered,” 19 April 2018
• “They Are Not Terrorists! The Terrorists at the FSB Torture People,” 16 April 2018
• “FSB and NTV Pressure Mother of Man Accused in ‘Terrorist’ Frame-Up,” 12 April 2018
• “A New Face in Hell: Yuli Boyarshinov,” 12 April 2018
• “Wife of Tortured Antifascist Seeks Asylum in Finland,” 11 April 2018
• “The FSB’s Tall Tales,” 10 April 2018
• “Families of Penza-Petersburg Terrorists Form Committee,” 9 April 2018
• “Extremism Inside Out,” 30 March 2018
• “Search and Intimidate,” 29 March 2018
• “Solidarity? (The Case of the Penza and Petersburg Antifascists),” 24 March 2018
• “Anna Tereshkina: At Viktor Filinkov’s Remand Extension Hearing,” 23 March 2018
• “Ping, Ping, Ping: The Remand Extension Hearing of the Penza ‘Terrorists,’” 20 March 2018
• “Tortured Petersburg Antifascist Viktor Filinkov Transferred to Remand Prison in Leningrad Region,” 17 March 2018
• “Svyatoslav Rechkalov: ‘They Proceeded to Pull Down My Trousers, Threatening to Shock Me in the Groin,’” 15 March 2018
• “They Jump on Anything That Moves, Part 3: The Case of the New Greatness Movement,” 15 March 2018
• “The Horrorshow Continues: Svyatoslav Rechkalov Tortured in Moscow,” 15 March 2018
• “The Rowdies Have to Be Apprehended Legally, So We Can Have a Celebration in the City on March 18, not Bedlam,” 15 March 2018
• “Ilya Kapustin: ‘When the Stamp Thudded in My Passport, It Was Like a Huge Weight Had Been Lifted from My Shoulders,’” 13 March 2018
• “Your Husband Safely Made the Flight to Minsk after We Abducted Him in Petersburg,” 2 March 2018
• “‘FSB Officers Always Get Their Way!’” 28 February 2018
• ‘The Case of the Anarchists: Disappearances, Torture, Frame-Up (11 AM, February 15, 2018, Moscow),” 14 February 2018
• “The Strange Investigation of a Strange Subway Attack,” 12 February 2018
• “Arrested Penza Antifascists Talk about Torture in Remand Prison,” 10 February 2018
• “Solidarity with Persecuted Russian Antifascists and Anarchists in NYC and Minneapolis,” 7 February 2018
• “Ilya Kapustin: ‘They Said They Could Break My Legs and Dump Me in the Woods,’” 31 January 2018
• “The Penza ‘Terrorism’ Case,” 30 January 2018
• “Breaking Bad with the FSB,” 29 January 2018
• “How ‘Stability’ Has Really Been Achieved in Russia,” 29 January 2018