Their stunt at Christ the Savior Cathedral was idiotic, and there’s really nothing to argue about. Whatever argument you take, from "you didn’t go into a mosque, did you" to "why do it at all" — all of it is true. To put it mildly, I would not have liked it if, while I was in church, some crazy girls ran in and started dashing around the altar. We have an undeniable fact: fools who committed petty hooliganism for publicity. The two main questions now are: Was their offense socially dangerous enough to justify keeping the girls behind bars? Obviously not. Are there circumstances that rule out holding the defendants in custody? Obviously yes.
Nadezhda Tolokonnikova has a small child — a four-year-old daughter.
Maria Alyokhina has a five-year-old son. There is no reason whatsoever to keep them in detention. Their places of residence are known, they have families, and they pose no threat to society. Or is there some fear that they will intimidate witnesses? That they’ll flee abroad on a private jet? They don’t even have the money to run anywhere. For example, the deputy chairman of Vnesheconombank, Ballo, who is accused of embezzling $14 million, was released on bail yesterday. So judicial “humanization” worked for him. And do you remember the daughter of the head of the Irkutsk election commission? She hit two people with her car — one was killed, the other was left disabled. She was not taken into custody, and was sentenced to three years in a penal settlement, with the sentence deferred for 14 years until her young child grows up. So are these somehow different children? Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina have gone on a hunger strike. They were locked in cells for 60 days during the investigation of an offense for which the punishment clearly should not be more than five days of administrative detention. They should have spent those five days sweeping the square around Christ the Savior Cathedral and reflecting on their behavior. This is senseless and disgusting cruelty, far worse than their utterly stupid but minor hooliganism. Here is a letter from parishioners to Patriarch Kirill (head of the Russian Orthodox Church). I can only support it. The most proper thing the Russian Orthodox Church can do now is show mercy and forgive these foolish girls, petition for their immediate release pending trial, and have a serious talk with them once they are free and back with their young children.