OVD Info | Telegram | June 29, 2021

Today at 3:00 p.m. a verdict will be announced in the trial of Roman Pichuzhin, an elections commission member targeted in the so-called Palace Case. Pichuzhin is represented by OVD Info lawyer Dmitri Zakhvatov.

Yesterday the prosecutor requested three years in prison [for Pichuzhin]. The court took only a day to examine the case.

We publish Roman Pichuzhin’s closing statement here.

Photographs and trial transcript provided by RP’s lawyer.

When I read [Gianni Rodari’s] Cippolino as a kid, I swore an oath that if I ever encountered Signor Tomato in my life, I would fight against him.

And you, esteemed prosecutor, esteemed riot policeman: when you read Cippolino, did you swear to serve Signor Tomato or to fight against him?

And when I watched the old Soviet movie about Cinderella, there was the last line, where the king says, “Connections are connections, of course, but when all’s said and done one must listen to one’s conscience. When they ask you, ‘And what exactly can you say for yourself?’ no connections in the world can help make a foot smaller, a soul bigger, or a heart more just.”

Why do we forget our childhood oaths? Why are you doing this?

Personally I can’t understand it. I don’t think you understand it either.

If, in order to remain free, I have to forget my childhood oaths, then I don’t want that kind of freedom. If keeping these oaths means I have to go to prison, well, fine, I’ll have to go.

In conclusion I want to recite some [Vladimir] Vysotsky.

If you’ve never in your life
Eaten meat with a knife
If with arms folded you just
Looked down on other folks
And you didn’t join the fight
Against the butchers and the scum —
Well, that means that in this life
You are just beside the point, you are nothing!

That’s all I have to say.

Translated by the Fabulous AM, with many thanks from me.

Elections commission member Roman Pichuzhin sentenced to two years in prison
Activatica
June 30, 2021

A court has sentenced Roman Pichuzhin, a defendant in the so-called Palace Affair and a member of a precinct election commission, to two years in a medium-security penal colony, reports OVD Info attorney Dmitry Zakhvatov.

On June 29, the Meshchansky District Court of Moscow found Pichuzhin guilty of using violence against authorities (punishable under Article 318.1 of the Criminal Code) at a rally in support of Alexei Navalny on January 31. The prosecution asked the court to sentence Pichuzhin three years in a medium-security penal colony. According to investigators, Pichuzhin struck a riot police officer in the torso with his fist on Komsomolskaya Square in Moscow. The court took only a day to examine the case.

[…]

Pichuzhin was detained on March 2 as he was leaving Special Detention Center No. 2, where he had served a thirty-day administrative sentence after being detained at a rally in support of Alexei Navalny on January 31.

Roman Pichuzhin is 44 years old and has an 11-year-old child. According to OVD Info, Pichuzhin suffers from epilepsy.

In January and February, large-scale protests took place, the first of which was advertised in Alexei Navalny’s film Putin’s Palace: The Story of the World’s Biggest Bribe. More than 11 thousand people were detained at the protest rallies. 134 people have been named as suspects and defendants in criminal cases: this is more than in the so-called Bolotnaya Square Case and the Moscow Case combined. Forty-nine criminal cases involve charges of using violence against the authorities (punishable under parts 1 and 2 of Article 318 of the Russian Federal Criminal Code), while twenty-three cases involve charges of obstructing roads (punishable under Article 267.1 of the Criminal Code). Some cases include charges of violating health and epidemic regulations, threatening the lives, health and safety of citizens, and involving minors in the commission of illegal actions.

Translated by the Russian Reader