The Syktyvkar City Court fined activist Nina Popugaeva from Syktyvkar for 5 thousand rubles for a picket in Stefanovskaya Square for the second time. Oleg Novikov, the Public Verdict's media relations officer, told 7x7 about it on September 28.
Judge Alexander Lekontsev, who had previously fined the activist for 5 thousand rubles, denied calling in witnesses and interrogating the police, whose reports and explanations were in the case, to Popugaeva’s lawyer Ernest Mezak.
After a short court hearing, Lekontsev decided to impose a similar fine. The activist's defense is planning to appeal the fine.
Activists Alyona Zezegova and Nina Popugaeva from Syktyvkar began holding one-person pickets in Stefanovskaya Square on July 2, 3 and 4, on the days after the vote on the amendments to the Russian Constitution. Three protocols on violating the procedure for holding a public event were drawn up against each of them. Zezegova was fined for a total of 20 thousand rubles, Popugaeva — for 10 thousand rubles.
The police drew up the reports referring the federal law on rallies and the decree of the Head of Syktyvkar.
The activists believe that they have not violated the law, because in November 2019, the Constitutional Court of Russia demanded that the ban, which had been in force since 2011, on rallies in the main town square of Syktyvkar be lifted. The Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation concluded that the republican law defied the spirit of federal laws and the Constitution.
