The prosecutor at the debate in the Basmanny District Court of Moscow requested Alexandra Bayazitova, the author of the telegram channel “Hell Grandmothers”, and Olga Arkharova, a media manager, to receive 14 and 13 years in prison, respectively, in the case of large-scale extortion. Lawyer Elena Fedulova reported this to TASS.
Life.ru journalist Bayazitova and Arkharova are accused of extorting 1.2 million rubles from Promsvyazbank vice-president Alexander Ushakov for “extending the negative block” in telegrams -the channel “Hell's Grandmothers”, which published economic news and criticized large banks (clause “b” of part 3 of Article 163 of the Criminal Code).
At the beginning of July 2023, a court in Moscow sentenced the administrator of the telegram channel “Financial guard» Inna Churilov, another person involved in the case, was given a four-year suspended sentence and a fine of 1 million rubles. The state prosecution requested a real sentence for her.
Churilova entered into a pre-trial agreement and, as Vedomosti wrote, provided the investigation with “full assistance in identifying accomplices and other crimes within the framework of the criminal case.” In court, she said that she apologized to Ushakov and paid him 420 thousand rubles for the damage caused.
Bayazitova, Arkharova and Churilova were sent to pre-trial detention in August 2022. Bayazitova asked to be placed under house arrest, as she was diagnosed with diabetes, hypertension and glaucoma. Then the journalist said that her elderly mother was in the hospital after surgery, and there were four cats left in the apartment. She called her case fabricated and emphasized that she simply wrote a note about Promsvyazbank.
Last November, Churilova’s preventive measure was replaced with house arrest, while the rest of the defendants remained in custody.