The Khimki City Court of the Moscow Region sentenced 27-year-old resident of the Kaluga Region Mikhail Ishchenko to ten years in prison, who set fire to the Russian flag at the entrance to the Rodina sports complex, the Moscow Region prosecutor's office reported.
Ishchenko was found guilty not only of desecration of the state flag (Article 329 of the Criminal Code) and hooliganism motivated by political hatred (clause “b” of Part 1 of Article 213 of the Criminal Code), but also of preparing to participate in hostilities in territory of a foreign state (Part 1 of Article 30 of the Criminal Code, Part 3 of Article 208 of the Criminal Code).
According to the prosecution, a drunken Ishchenko burned the flag on September 24, 2023, “demonstrating clear disrespect for civil and patriotic feelings, the authority and dignity of the Russian Federation.”
The prosecutor's office did not specify which military formation Ishchenko intended to participate in. He will spend the first two years of his sentence in prison, the rest of the time in a maximum security colony.
Ishchenko’s arrest was reported on September 26 last year by the Mash telegram channel. On the same day he was sent to a pre-trial detention center, he admitted guilt. Mash posted surveillance video of a man climbing a fence and setting a flag on fire. Then a young man, apparently a teenager, catches up with him and kicks him.
Astra, without specifying sources, wrote that security forces found in the phone of the detained Ishchenko correspondence with a representative of the Russian Volunteer Corps (RDK) fighting on the side of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, who “advised him to apply for a foreign passport in order to leave Russia.”