Russian woman sentenced to correctional tasks for criticism of police

Russia’s Taganrog City Court sentenced local resident Yelizaveta Tsvetkova to a year of correctional tasks for spreading leaflets criticizing the police.

The woman printed the leaflets from VKontakte social network, Lenta.ru news website reports.

The court ruled that the leaflets criticizing the law enforcement bodies, which Tsvetkova pasted on lampposts and bus stops in autumn 2015, incited hatred towards the police (Article 282). The leaflets referred to Major Denis Yevsiukov, who is serving a life sentence for the murder of two people in the metropolitan supermarket as well as tortures in the police department in Tatarstan.

According to lawyer Yuri Chupilkin, the leaflets did not incite the hatred towards the police, but was directed against the illegal actions of the law enforcement officers.

The girl’s action was timed to the Day of the Interior Ministry Officer, which is marked in Russia on November 10.

The Deputy Prosecutor of Taganrog city asked to sentence Tsvetkova to one year of penal settlement.