Accused of: Falsification of criminal cases for political reasons, violation of constitutional rights and freedoms of man and citizen, complicity in organizing repressions, and assistance in establishing a dictatorship.
Until August 2018, he led the New Greatness case and headed the investigative team, which included members of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation: Senior Lieutenant of Justice E. Rogozyansky, Senior Investigator V. Almazov, Captain of Justice A. Berlev, Investigator A. Braginskaya, and Major of Justice M. Proskurin.
On March 15, 2018, 10 people were arrested in Moscow on charges of creating the extremist community “New Greatness”: Vyacheslav Kryukov, Ruslan Kostylenkov, Petr Karamzin, Dmitry Poletaev, Maria Dubovik, Anna Pavlikova, Maxim Roshchin, Pavel Rebrovsky, Sergei Gavrilov and Rustam Rustamov.
According to investigators, ten members of “New Greatness” created and led an informal political association. The organization's goal was “to participate without alternatives in popular uprisings, revolutionary actions, and confrontations with representatives of the current regime in Russia.”
According to human rights activists and independent experts, the investigation's progress and the prosecution's position indicate a direct interest on the part of law enforcement agencies in fabricating the case. The defendants have repeatedly claimed they were provoked by the security services, and their claims have been supported by compelling evidence from the defense.
A detailed examination of the case revealed that law enforcement officers repeatedly violated procedural rules during the investigation, withheld and distorted information, ignored evidence of the defendants' innocence and their rights, and used torture.
Facts indicating that the case was fabricated (from the lawyers’ statements in court, as well as from information posted in open sources):
1. The indictment lacks the obligatory part of the crime — the motive.
2. In the indictment presented by A. Malyugin to the court, the concepts of “extremism” (contained in Article 1 of the Federal Law “On Combating Extremism” of July 25, 2002) and “extremist crime” (from note 2 to Article 282.1 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) are confused.
3. It is impossible to understand from the text of the indictment what specific crimes were committed by the accused.
4. In stating the purpose of the alleged crime, the prosecution used vague formulations. In particular, the text of the conclusion stated that, within the framework of “New Greatness,” Maria Dubovik, who was 19 years old at the time of her arrest, intended to remove V. Putin's “entourage” from power (the system of state authorities is established by the Constitution of the Russian Federation; the position of “V. Putin's entourage” is not established within it, and criminal liability for “removing V. Putin's entourage from power” is also not provided for).
5. Maria Dubovik, whom the prosecution presented to the court as a “person without a specific occupation,” a “follower and adherent of Maltsev and the ideology of the Artpodgotovka movement,” was a second-year student at the Veterinary Academy at the time of her arrest and knew nothing about the oppositionist Maltsev (there were also inaccuracies in the descriptions of the other defendants).
6. The video recordings, which the investigation believes incriminated the defendants, were installed in the premises in advance, without the owner's knowledge, and were paid for by a “secret witness.” The rent significantly exceeded membership dues. Furthermore, the premises were rented not only on the days of the meetings but also on other days, which allowed for the recordings to be copied and subsequently transmitted to third parties, as well as altered and replaced by investigators (notably, the operational report on the organization was prepared for law enforcement the day after Ruslan D. (the prosecution's main witness) filed a complaint, although the document includes transcripts of hours-long meetings).
7. The forensic analysis of the printed materials commissioned by A. Malyugin was conducted by specialists whose competence was questioned by the defense, given that they claimed three years of professional experience. This analysis appears to be unsound, as it was based on the same report compiled by the operatives based on the testimony of the key witness. However, it continued to be used as evidence. The forensic analysis of the organization's leaflets, program, and charter, which found no calls to violence, was rejected by investigator A. Malyugin as unsatisfactory (conducted by the research center (MIC) and the Forensic Center under the Ministry of Justice). Information about their existence was concealed from the defense to prevent review and appeal.
8. Investigator A. Malyugin refused to conduct a re-examination of Anna Pavlikova, who had been undergoing treatment for a long time due to a serious nervous breakdown, based on new circumstances. Significantly, the expert believes Anna is suggestible, and an analysis of her correspondence with Ruslan D. indicates the presence of manipulative techniques in his speech.
9. Investigator A. Malyugin did not consider it necessary to conduct a confrontation between Anna and Ruslan D, despite significant contradictions in their testimony.
10. During the trial, it was revealed that the Telegram chat correspondence, which was included in the case as evidence, was transferred to third parties during the investigation, who made changes to it.
11. The indictment was based on testimony extracted under torture. Three hours before the defendant Kostylenkov's final court appearance, Meduza published a letter from the latter detailing the methods used against him on the day of his arrest (March 15, 2018): “beating his kidneys,” “putting a bag over his head,” and “stuffing the handle of a kitchen hammer into his anus.” (On that day, Kostylenkov confessed to founding an extremist group, but later retracted it, reporting torture.) The defendant, Rebrovsky, also retracted his testimony, claiming it was made under duress.
12. According to the testimony of one of the defendants, a “brood hen” (a technique used by law enforcement agencies to obtain necessary information or provoke) was planted on her in the pre-trial detention center.
13. On the eve of her arrest, one of the accused voluntarily left the alleged extremist community, but was returned through the efforts of the same key witness, Ruslan D.
14. The entire indictment is based on the testimony of three undercover agents and one secret witness—a secret service agent named Ruslan D., whose testimony no one can corroborate. Ruslan D. denied his affiliation with the Investigative Committee, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, or the FSB, but revealed his identity when transferring money for the premises' rent—the transactions list his real name, Radu Zelinsky.
Detailed information about the actions of Ruslan D. in the criminal case under consideration is provided in the dossier on Rada Zelinsky (aka Rodion Zelinsky), Konstantinov Alexander Andreevich, Ruslan Danilov (D), an operative of the criminal investigation department of the police, presumably an FSB employee.
During the operational search conducted by security forces under the direction of Chief Investigator A. Malyugin, the defendants were subjected to cruel and degrading treatment. R. Kostylenkov reported that on the day of his arrest, armed men with automatic weapons burst into his home, threw him to the floor, and began beating him. They handcuffed him and sat him on a chair. They continued to beat him in the face and back of the head. Then, an operative took a bag of white powder and stuffed it into his underwear. When Kostylenkov asked, “What is this?” the operative replied, “You'll recognize it.”
A quote from the testimony: “...they put a bag over my head, choked me, put me in a tether, and hit me in the kidneys...Then an operative came up and said we were going to record a video. He handed me a piece of paper with the text. The video is online, where I confess to the crimes. They filmed it about 20 times. Oh, and I completely forgot that before they slipped me the drugs, they brought me leaflets and put them on the table.”
During her arrest, violence was used against minor A. Pavlikova and her relatives. A. Pavlikova testified that after her arrest, she was held for 24 hours without water or drink, and in an unheated police van, after which she developed serious health problems. A participant in the trial also testified that she saw a group of operatives take R. Kostylenkov to a “room” next to investigator Malyugin, from where the sounds of beatings could be heard. According to A. Pavlikova, these same operatives threatened her and other defendants after torturing Kostylenkov and bragged to them about the “evidence” they had obtained.
M. Dubovik's health, diagnosed with a tumor, suffered severely during her stay in pretrial detention. Anna Narinskaya described M. Dubovik's detention in an article published on OVD INFO:
“(…) 16 hours of constant interrogation, threats, refusal to contact parents, refusal to call a doctor, four days in a temporary detention facility (OVD-Info) on a bunk without a toothbrush or a change of underwear.”
The defendants were required to “cooperate” with the investigation and renounce their lawyers.
The defendants' relatives have been subjected to repeated pressure and threats from investigators. This has been repeatedly stated by the defense, as well as the defendants' mothers.
One of the key witnesses, Yu. Kunitsina, was subjected to pressure from law enforcement agencies to not report transactions conducted on behalf of R. Zelinsky.
According to defense attorney S. Sidorkina, “The investigation used its entire arsenal: threats, intimidation, and outright blackmail.” Repeated complaints against the actions of security forces were unsuccessful—the Investigative Committee declined to open a criminal case for the use of violence “due to the lack of evidence of a crime.”
Investigator A. Malyugin petitioned to extend the pretrial detention periods of the youngest defendants, Anna Pavlikova and Maria Dubovik.
