Press Release, 8.03.2022

Photo: Maria Krivenko / Photo from social networks

Maria Krivenko, Chairperson of the Rostov-on-Don branch of Yabloko received ten days of administrative arrest for “petty hooliganism”, which she did not commit. Maria and Yabloko will appeal against the decision of the court.

On the evening of 7 March, the Leninsky District Court of the city of Rostov-on-Don ruled out that Maria Krivenko was guilty of “petty hooliganism” within an administrative case filed against her.

The leader of the Rostov-on-Don branch of Yabloko was detained at the office of the regional branch of the party on the morning of 6 March and taken to the police station. She spent a day and a half in the police department, where employees of the Centre for Combating Extremism (Centre “E”) exerted psychological pressure on her, threatening to “imprison her for a long term”.

The night of 6-7 March Maria spent in the same cell with a homeless man and could not sleep.

At the trial, Krivenko was accused of swearing in the street and grabbing the hands of passers-by. The court did not take into account that Krivenko’s mother, with whom they live together, is disabled and is currently ill with coronavirus.

The defence intends to appeal the administrative arrest to a court of higher instance.

Maria Krivenko is 33, she graduated from the Faculty of Applied Political Science of the Southern Federal University.

On 4 March, Vladimir Beradze, another activist of the Rostov-on-Don branch of Yabloko and an aid-man at the COVID hospital, got 15 days of imprisonment for “petty hooliganism”. He was one of those who submitted an application to the city administration for holding the action “For Peace”.

On 6 March, the city court of Taganrog (the Rostov Region) imposed a fine of 60,000 roubles on another Yabloko member Yaroslav Revenko. He was charged under Articles 20.3.3 of the Code of Administrative Offenses – a recently adopted article on liability for “discrediting the Russian armed forces”. The court considered Revenko’s pacifist stance as “discrediting the army”.