Navalny was tried in Russia.
Moscow's Lefortovo Court sentenced to 9 years in prison for opposition politician Alexei Navalny in a new case of fraud and insulting a judge. He was also fined 1.2 million rubles.In the morning, the court found the politician guilty on all counts. Judge Margarita Kotova, during the reading of the verdict, stated that «the data of the witnesses are confirmed by the data from the victims». The testimony of the witness for the prosecution Gorozhanko, who called the charges against Navalny «absurd» in the decision, she assessed «critically» in the decision. The judge also recognized as reliable the testimony of the victim Kostenko, which was given during the preliminary investigation, and not during the trial, where he abandoned his claims against Navalny.
Under the second article, according to the prosecution, the Anti-Corruption Foundation embezzled donations received from its supporters. The indictment says that Navalny and his associates by «deceit and breach of trust» collected donations for the election campaign, but disposed of them «for personal purposes and for activities». Of the 300 thousand people who donated to Navalny's structures, only four were recognized as victims. In addition, the same trial dealt with allegations of contempt of court in last year's defamation of a veteran.
The visiting court session was held in a correctional colony in the city of Pokrov, Vladimir Region: there, the politician is serving a sentence in the «case «Yves Rocher».
The policy was charged with two episodes of article 297 of the Criminal Code (part 1 , «Insult of the participants in the trial», and part 4, «Insult of the judge») and four episodes of part 4 of Article 159 of the Criminal Code («Fraud on an especially large scale»).
In the case of insult, the judges of the opposition were accused of showing disrespect to the participants in the court session during the consideration of the case of libel against veteran Ignat Artemenko a year ago and, at the same time, of fraud in collecting donations for the anti-corruption activities of the FBK.
16 witnesses for the prosecution were interrogated in court: these are four victims, three experts and nine witnesses, including former FBK employee Fyodor Gorozhanko, who called the accusation against Navalny «absurd». Nearly 30 witnesses, constant donors of the FBK, spoke on behalf of the defense at the meetings. Everyone said that donations to the work of Navalny and his team were voluntary and transparent.
During the days of the hearings on Navalny’s cases, Judge Margarita Kotova called up an employee of the presidential administration, Yevgeny Vladimirov, says fellow politician Ivan Zhdanov, available which turned out to be the details of the judge's calls. Navalny himself, speaking in the debate, read out the dates and exact times of these calls and suggested that his trial was controlled by the administration.
On March 18, Putin promoted judge Margarita Kotova. She was appointed a judge of the Moscow City Court.
In his last speech, Navalny called the case against him fabricated and said that he considered two of the victims to be figureheads, and two — clearly intimidated, since they themselves were defendants in criminal cases. He spoke out against the war in Ukraine, accusing the Russian authorities of unleashing it, and also said that «will continue to fight with the authorities» and is not afraid of «neither the FSB, nor chemical weapons, nor Putin».