In Rostov-on-Don, consideration of a resonant criminal case began against 24 alleged members of the Ukrainian division of Azov (recognized as terrorist in the Russian Federation and prohibited). Fifteen men who served in it at different times and in different positions, and nine women who work mainly as cooks, are charged with the forcible seizure of power in the DPR, as well as participation in a terrorist organization. Most of the defendants partially pleaded guilty.
The Southern District Military Court began hearing the criminal case of alleged participants in the banned Azov, who are charged with committing crimes under Art. 278 (forcible seizure of power) of the Criminal Code and art. 205.5 (participation in a terrorist organization) of the Criminal Code.
At the first meeting, it turned out that two of the accused – David Kasatkin and Dmitry Labinsky – were handed over to the Ukrainian authorities in exchange for captured Russians. Whether they will now be tried in absentia or whether the charges against them are dropped in connection with the exchange was not discussed at the court session.
Two more – Elena Avramova and Oleg Mizhgorodsky – were not taken from the pre-trial detention center to the courtroom due to illness. Even taking into account the absence of four people, the largest number of defendants for the entire time of the judicial practice of the Southern District Military Court took part in this process.
In the course of the proceedings, the identities of the accused were established, and the prosecutor’s petition for the extension of the measure of restraint in the form of arrest by the defendants was considered.
As stated in the materials of the investigation, among the defendants in the criminal case are servicemen of the National Guard of Ukraine, taken prisoner or detained after the start of a special military operation. So, Oleg Zharkov was captured in March 2022 when leaving the military camp in Mariupol, Artur Gretsky – on the territory of the Azovstal plant in April 2022, Alexei Smykov – leaving the combat zone after receiving many injuries. Not far from the territories where the hostilities took place, also in 2022, members of the nationalist unit Alexander Merochenets and Nikita Timonin were caught, and Alexander Ishchenko, who joined it shortly after the start of the SVO, was caught.
Some of the accused are former members of a banned organization. Thus, the defendant Alexander Irkha was detained at his home in Mariupol by the People’s Militia of the DPR in April 2022 due to the fact that he served in the tank unit of the terrorist “Azov” in 2015-2020. Also former members of the squad are Alexander Mukhin, Anatoly Gritsyk and Yaroslav Zhdamarov, Oleg Mizhgorodsky, Oleg Tyshkul and Artem Grebeshkov, who left it between 2018 and 2021.
All the accused women signed confessions, according to the materials of the criminal case.
So, Natalya Golfiner, who worked as the head of the food warehouse of the banned Azov, was on sick leave in February 2022 and refused to go to work, and in April she voluntarily turned to the DPR police, which detained her. The cooks Irina Mogitich, Elena Avramova, Vladislav Mayboroda and Marina Tekin, who were detained under other circumstances, signed the appearances.
Four more defendants – chefs Nina Bondarenko, Alena Bondarchuk, Lilia Rudenko and Lilia Pavrianidis – were detained on March 17, 2022. According to investigators, Tatyana Timosheva, the head of the food service of the banned Azov, ordered the female cooks to leave all the documents and things linking them to military service and leave Mariupol on that day. They were taken to the city center in a Kozak armored car, from there they went on foot to Yalta to the house of one of the cooks of the terrorist Azov, Lilia Rudenko. When the women went to the Melekinsky checkpoint on the outskirts of Mariupol, they were detained by servicemen from the DPR and Chechnya.
During interrogations, the defendants admitted that they served in a unit that, at the request of the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office, was banned by the Supreme Court only in August 2022, but insisted that they were not engaged in terrorist or other illegal activities.
Many of them stated that they considered the service an ordinary job and went to it mainly for the sake of a stable salary and out of a desire to solve family problems – for example, to raise money for the treatment of a relative or to provide a higher education to a child.
At the same time, interestingly, dozens of other servicemen of the banned “Azov”, who were taken prisoner in Mariupol, in the TFR did not at all incriminate the commission of such “common” crimes as the forcible seizure of power in the DPR and participation in a terrorist organization, but they accused them in specific criminal acts, as a rule, murders or attempts on them, as well as in the use of prohibited means and methods of war (Art. 105 and Art. 356 of the Criminal Code). The cases of such defendants are considered individually by the DPR Supreme Court.
When discussing the petition of the state prosecutor to extend the arrest, the majority of the defendants asked to change their measure of restraint to a milder one. Several women noted that young children were waiting for them at home. However, the court extended the detention of all the accused in the pre-trial detention center until September 29.