This morning I paid 56,500 rubles to the Moscow Metro.
No, this is not a fare increase. It is a sharp increase in the cost of expressing your opinion.
The Metro collected this amount from me, Zhdanov, Milov, Stepanov, Galyamina, Solovyov, and Yashin because on the day of the rally against barring independent candidates from the Moscow City Duma elections, there were more passengers in the subway.
And for that, we are supposed to pay.
This document belongs in a museum of legal absurdities. I am sure that one day it will be studied in law schools.
Enforcement proceedings were initiated only against me, and I had to pay; otherwise, there would have been another round of those delightful tricks with searches and property seizures.
But of course, this is just a drop in the bucket.
As of today, they are trying to recover a total of 29,678,758 rubles from me, Zhdanov, Sobol, Alburov, Milov, Stepanov, Galyamina, Solovyov, and Yashin in favor of Mosgortrans, Avtodorogi, the Metro, Anchor LLC (the Armenia restaurant), the Moscow branch of the Interior Ministry, and the Moscow prosecutor.
Claims totaling 9,503,350 rubles have already been heard and granted.
We have already paid 4,674,233 rubles.
By common agreement, we dumped this onto Vladimir Milov’s shoulders; he is coordinating the fundraising and the payment of these fines.
Without question—and there is not the slightest doubt about it—all of these “court rulings” will not stand up at the ECHR (European Court of Human Rights) (to answer the obvious question right away: even if Russia leaves the Council of Europe, complaints filed before that happens will still be considered). Everything there is so blatantly unlawful that it is hardly even worth doing a legal analysis. But that takes time.
If anyone wants to contribute to the common pot, message Volodya privately on Facebook or Twitter.