It seems we’ve started to forget what Alexei Navalny’s speedy and astonishing trials are like. For two years, there was nothing especially remarkable like this, not since the verdict in the Yves Rocher case, whose announcement was scheduled for one date and then delivered on another.
There was also the administrative detention, but that was small stuff by comparison.
But now the judicial system is dusting off its best tricks.
On November 16, the Presidium of the Supreme Court ruled to overturn all verdicts in the Kirovles case.
By November 18—at 8:33 in the morning!—the case had already appeared on the website of the Leninsky District Court in Kirov, assigned to Judge Vtyurin (there he is, the new star of the Russian courts—welcome him). So it was clearly hand-delivered, not sent by mail.
And today as well, at 8:30 in the morning, my lawyers got a call from the court informing them that the first hearing would be on December 5 at 9 a.m.
And once again they tossed aside the legally required preliminary hearings—one of the very violations we took to the ECHR (European Court of Human Rights), where we won.
Wow. If only ordinary court proceedings moved this fast. People wouldn’t have to wait years for decisions in trivial cases.
Someone in the Kremlin is clearly very bothered by the fact that my right to run in elections has been restored. They want to take it away again as quickly as possible—just in case.
Well, if it’s court, then it’s court. Since 2010, that’s basically all I’ve been doing—going to them. And after Bastrykin opened four criminal cases against me in a single week in 2012 (after I called for an unauthorized rally), my capacity to be shocked dropped pretty much to zero.
It’ll be like in *Interstellar* and films like it—very trendy: a time loop, everything all over again. Everyone seems to know how it ends, but the repetition is inevitable.
Nevertheless, I have to inform everyone—and first and foremost the Leninsky District Court and Judge Vtyurin—that I will not be able to take part in the hearing on December 5. I simply do not have that possibility, precisely because of the unlawful actions of the executive and judicial authorities.
I am obliged to comply with the court’s ruling, and officials are obliged too. So let’s each do our part in turn. The ECHR ruled that I must be reimbursed for the costs I incurred in the first trial: €48,000, including documented expenses for lawyers, tickets to Kirov, and hotel accommodation.
Many months have already passed since the Russian Ministry of Justice became unconditionally obliged to pay me that amount. I even wrote to them, and nothing has happened.
Or is the idea that the verdict has been overturned, I’m supposed to start traveling again, and no one reimburses the old expenses? I’m not an official, and I’m not a member of the Ozero dacha cooperative (a group closely associated with Putin’s inner circle), so I can’t just pull the necessary amount of money out of some magic pot or bedside drawer.
Each trip means: 1) three round-trip tickets (for me and two lawyers), and 2) three hotel rooms, if we have to stay overnight.
Why should I have to pay again now, if this new trial is happening because of the unlawful actions of a judge of the Leninsky District Court in Kirov, as established by the ECHR and confirmed by the Presidium of the Supreme Court?
Okay, I can pay—but then return what you owe me, and I’ll pay for it out of that money.
Under the Leninsky Court’s verdict, I paid a fine of 500,000 rubles into the bank account specified by the court. Incidentally, in 2013 that was worth considerably more than it is now. The verdict has been overturned as unlawful. The Leninsky Court is tripping over itself to schedule a new case, so it also has an obligation to return those 500,000 rubles to me.
Did everyone just casually forget about that? I didn’t, sorry—for me, 500,000 rubles is a lot of money.
Dear Leninsky Court: first you have an obligation to return the unlawfully collected fine, and only then to schedule a new hearing. Return it—and I’ll have the money to come.
(and this is very important) In the actions of the people directing Judge Vtyurin, I see a cunning effort aimed at sabotaging two trials at once: mine, and the ongoing murder trial over Boris Nemtsov’s killing in the Moscow District Military Court.
They know perfectly well that one of my lawyers in the Kirovles case is Olga Mikhailova, and that right now she is in the Nemtsov jury trial three times a week, representing his relatives.
And key developments are happening there right now. The day before yesterday, the cleaning woman who worked in the killers’ apartment gave quite sensational testimony, saying that the person in charge was Ruslan Geremeyev, commander of the Sever battalion of the Interior Troops regiment, and not some driver. But the investigation is trying to portray that very driver as the person who ordered and organized Nemtsov’s murder.
As you may recall, even FSB special forces could not get Geremeyev out of Chechnya, and Kadyrov would not even allow him to be questioned. He is the key figure here, linking the actual killers to the real people who ordered the murder. I’ve said many times already: I believe it was Delimkhanov and Kadyrov. After that, the only question is whether they received direct instructions or merely misread the hints.
Now there’s going to be a whole saga over the lawyer. The district military court is the higher court. There’s a jury there, and the suspects are under arrest. Urgency matters there. But what urgency is there in Kirovles, where the verdict was handed down three and a half years ago and after that nobody gave a damn? They only started twitching because of my electoral rights.
Legal ethics forbid Mikhailova from representing clients when it is physically impossible to do so. And in my case she is a key defense lawyer; it was with her that we handled the ECHR case.
My second lawyer, Vadim Kobzev, also has cases and ongoing proceedings.
To sum up:
I’m not hiding anywhere. I’m working as usual.
I cannot appear at the trial because the money legally owed to me from the first trial has not been returned. And no one is even trying to pretend that anything will be repaid.
I am writing a letter to Judge Vtyurin proposing options fully provided for by law: a) I participate by video conference; b) the court pays for my travel (let me remind you that in the Yves Rocher case, witnesses were flown in all the way from France at the state’s expense); c) the judge takes lawful measures and returns the fine unlawfully collected from me. The case is before him; only he can do that.
What is it Putin likes to say? “Everyone is equal before the law.”
Well then, let’s do things in the proper order.