The Moscow City Court refused to release director Yevgenia Berkovich and playwright Svetlana Petreychuk from custody, accused of justifying terrorism because of the production of the play Finist the Bright Falcon. The defense argued that the women were sent to jail for putting on an “anti-terrorist” performance and insisted on their release. Yevgenia Berkovich stated that she was ready for any preventive measure and called for her to be released to foster children, while Svetlana Petrichuk assured that she was not going to run away, but wanted to “restore her reputation” during the investigation.
More than two hundred people came to the Moscow City Court to support the defendants. Only a small part of the people got into the hall on the second floor, where exactly at 10:00 the first meeting started on the legality of Yevgenia Berkovich’s arrest. The rest had to go to the broadcast, where people even sat on the floor.
The hearing was held in the absence of the investigator, at whose request Berkovich was imprisoned in a pre-trial detention center. Three lawyers of the director asked to cancel the decision of the Zamoskvoretsky court of the capital of May 5. Then the court, at the request of the investigation of the Investigation Department of the Investigative Committee of Russia for the Central Administrative District of the capital, sent Berkovich into custody until July 4.
Adopted daughters and charity
In the appeal, the lawyers pointed out that the defendant is involved in charitable activities, has a permanent place of residence in Moscow, she does not have foreign citizenship and property abroad. She did not try to hide or interfere with the proceedings, and the witnesses interrogated in the case “provide evidence exculpating her.” “According to the defenders, there is no basis for choosing such a severe measure of restraint as detention,” Judge Irina Sysoeva voiced the lawyers’ complaint. In it, the defenders reminded that they had previously offered bail for Berkovich to the district court, and also presented a number of guarantors. They called the district court’s decision formal, arbitrary, unreasonable and “violating human rights.”
During the hearing, the defendant’s lawyer, Ksenia Karpinskaya, attached a number of documents, in particular, about the condition of two adopted daughters, Berkovich, aged 17 and 18. The lawyer said that they had already been taken and returned to other families several times. In her opinion, there is a possibility that due to the absence of a mother, girls can get “serious disorders of the psycho-emotional state.” “One girl was bullied, and now she is being pulled out of her foster family again,” the lawyer said, adding that Berkovich has two grandmothers, aged 88 and 89.
The criminal case, in which the district court arrested director Yevgenia Berkovich and screenwriter Svetlana Petreychuk on May 5, was initiated by the Investigative Committee of the ICR for the Central Administrative District of the capital on April 10, 2023. The reason was the play “Finist – the Clear Falcon”, staged by director Yevgenia Berkovich based on the play by Petriychuk. It told the story of women who decided in absentia to marry representatives of radical Islam and move to Syria.
The authors of the production were charged with “publicly justifying terrorism or promoting terrorism using the media or the Internet” (part 2 of article 205.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). It involves punishment from a fine in the amount of 300 thousand to 1 million rubles to real imprisonment for a term of five to seven years in prison.
They did not admit their guilt. According to the authors and participants of the play, the production is, in fact, a documentary, and when writing the play, materials from the criminal cases of Russian women, in particular, a former student of Moscow State University Varvara Karaulova, were used.
The play that opened the eyes
Regarding the content of the performance, lawyer Ksenia Karpinskaya said that the investigation was misinterpreting its meaning. She gave the court a letter of gratitude that Berkovich received in the pre-trial detention center. In it, the woman wrote that the performance “Finist – the Bright Falcon” “opened her eyes” to her sister and she did not go to the guy in Syria.
The defense devoted most of the meeting to the analysis of a comprehensive destructological examination. It was conducted by the Moscow State Linguistic University (MSLU) under the guidance of expert Roman Silantiev.
Previously, the expert and his colleagues came to the conclusion that the YouTube video with the reading of the play, which they investigated, contains statements expressing the justification for the departure of young women from the country in order to take part in the activities of the Islamic State banned in the Russian Federation and recognized as a terrorist organization. .
The text of the examination, the lawyers noted, they received only for a hearing in the appeal. It was this document that formed the basis for the accusation and election of Berkovich as a measure of restraint in the form of detention and is the only evidence of Berkovich’s guilt, Ksenia Karpinskaya insisted. She drew the attention of the higher court to the fact that the criminal case was initiated on April 10, while the investigator appointed the examination three days later. “That is, the investigator, after the initiation of the case, decided to find out if it contained signs of justifying terrorism,” the lawyer noted.
Expert commentator
The lawyer added that “everything would be nice if the expert Roman Silantiev did not endlessly comment on his expertise with negative connotations.” According to the defender, in a recent interview with the Kommersant newspaper, Silatyev said that Berkovich, either “out of illiteracy, or deliberately disguised a pro-terrorist performance as an anti-terrorist one.”
Earlier, on May 26, Berkovich’s defense sent a statement to the Investigative Committee of Russia and the prosecutor’s office, demanding that a criminal case be initiated against Silantyev. They believe that his statements contain signs of inciting hatred and enmity (Article 282 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation).
During the hearing in the Moscow City Court, Berkovich’s defense attached the linguistic opinion of Doctor of Philology, Professor Mikhail Dymarsky. At the request of the Russian Jewish Congress charitable organization, he analyzed an interview with an expert from the Lomovka telegram channel and found signs of anti-Semitism in it.
Karpinskaya called for the release of the accused from the pre-trial detention center, noting that her client should not be in custody, especially “according to such strange evidence.” “Berkovich should not be chosen any measure of restraint. But if the court considers that she should be elected, then she should not be associated with detention in the isolation ward, ”said the lawyer.
She and her colleagues asked to choose Berkovich as a measure of restraint, house arrest, prohibition of certain actions or bail, without naming a specific amount.
“Random Victims of Evil”
Berkovich herself, who was depressed during the arrest and practically did not speak, made a speech at the Moscow City Court. She stated that she was innocent of the crime. “There was no crime and it is very difficult to be involved in what was not. What I am involved in is the staging of the play, ”said the accused. According to her, the production put forward “a very simple and transparent idea” that dozens of women in our time become, I emphasize, random victims of evil. In the production, the authors of the play tried to understand why this is happening, Berkovich continued. “Understanding and justifying why this happens are two different things,” the director insisted. She compared herself to a doctor who “is obliged to understand the cause of the disease.” “A work of art cannot be created according to the principle “this is good, and this is bad,” she concluded, adding that in the play they simply “humanly sympathize” with its heroines. The defendant also stressed that the project was sponsored by the Ministry of Culture. “Do you really think that the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation will give at least a ruble for the propaganda of terrorism?” the arrested woman asked a rhetorical question.
She asked to be released to her adopted daughters, expressing her fear that her absence for them could end in a “severe psychiatric breakdown.” “I am ready for any measure of restraint. If they tell me to sit in a closet for three months, I will sit in a closet,” the director said, calling her family “traditional.”
In conclusion, Berkovich noted that the performance was staged in 2019 and has already been withdrawn from the repertoire, and its costumes and scenery have been eliminated.
The prosecutor called the decision of the district court motivated, lawful and justified and asked to leave it in force. Judge Irina Sysoeva did just that.
A couple of hours later, another judge, Yulia Bobrova, made a similar decision in the same room, deeming the arrest of Svetlana Petriychuk lawful. The latter stated that she was not going to hide from the investigation, as she intended to protect her good name. “I know for sure that I did not break the law, did not use a single element in my play that would be considered extremist. I just did my job, and this job was repeatedly approved by various government institutions. Not only am I not going to hide from the investigation, but I also feel my responsibility to ensure that in the course of investigative actions I get my full justification and restoration of business reputation, ”said the accused. Petriychuk explained that she bought the tickets to Turkey, which the investigation referred to, even before the initiation of the criminal case and wanted to go there for the May holidays.
“Non-Existent Crime”
Leaving the court, the defendants’ lawyers announced that they intended to file cassation appeals. According to the lawyer Ksenia Karpinskaya, Yevgenia Berkovich and Svetlana Petriychuk were prosecuted “for a non-existent crime.” She considers the decision of the judges to arrest unfair. “There is no evidence that Berkovich and Petriychuk are guilty (of the alleged crime). If a person put on a performance, any work of art, he should not be in a pre-trial detention center for this after some time, ”Karpinskaya believes.
According to her, if we follow the logic of the investigation, then “Dostoevsky would already be in prison, because his Crime and Punishment is a book about a maniac who killed an old woman, and he should be convicted for this.” “It is necessary to condemn Othello, who strangled Desdemona, as well as other works of art,” the defender noted. She stressed that the performance “Finist – Yasny Sokol” is “a performance about how women went to ISIS (the old name for the Islamic State), how bad it is and how it should not be done, and then they were condemned.” “The author who writes a work can sympathize with any heroes, but not share their position. In this case, a work of art is being judged,” the lawyer said.