Complaints from Chechen residents formed the basis of a criminal case against Shchepikhin

The court refused to transfer blogger Areg Shchepikhin, who was detained after being kidnapped by Chechen security forces at a Moscow train station, to house arrest. Shchepikhin accused investigators of pressuring him, refusing to admit guilt in insulting the feelings of believers.

As "Kavkazsky Uzel" reported, the participants in the kidnapping of blogger Areg Shchepikhin at the Yaroslavsky train station in Moscow, three of whom presented IDs of employees of the Russian Guard Directorate for Chechnya, were released on their own recognizance. The court arrested Shchepikhin himself for two months in a case of calls for extremism and incitement of hatred. On June 26, Shchepikhin apologized in court to residents of the Caucasus, stating that he repented, but the court refused to soften his preventive measure. In the final indictment, Shchepikhin is charged with three criminal articles1, the defense called the article on insulting religious feelings excessive. On July 29, the court extended Shchepikhin’s arrest for six months, until January 22.

At today's court hearing in the case of blogger Areg Shchepikhin, it turned out that the accused had changed his defense attorney - Andrei Bezverkhny, who had been defending the blogger from the very beginning, was replaced by his appointed attorney Oksana Sotnikova. As Shchepikhin himself explained, he ran out of money to pay for a lawyer, a "Caucasian Knot" correspondent reported from the courtroom. Neither Shchepikhin's relatives nor friends came to court - in the courtroom, in addition to the participants in the trial, there were only ten journalists.

According to the indictment read out in court, on June 2, Shchepikhin made a video recording of his own interview, which he posted on his personal Instagram page*. In this video, he “intentionally insulted objects of Muslim religious worship, thereby insulting the religious feelings of believers, and also made a discriminatory demand that Chechens and Muslims leave the territory of the Russian Federation.” The insults also included “a threat to commit sexual intercourse with objects of worship, including Allah and the Koran,” according to the indictment.

In the next video, recorded and published on June 3, the blogger addressed Armenians, calling on them to “beat and take money” from Chechens and Dagestanis. In a third video, published the same day, Shchepikhin called on listeners to convince government officials of “negative actions towards Russians” by Muslims, Jews, and natives of the North Caucasus, and also called for "killing them, recapturing them and forcing them to leave the territory of the Russian Federation."

After the indictment was announced, Areg Shchepikhin said that he understood the charges and that he admitted his guilt. Later, however, the blogger said that he did not want to admit guilt under the article on insulting the feelings of believers (Article 148 of the Criminal Code of Russia) - according to Shchepikhin, he was forced to sign a confession of guilt under this article.

Shchepikhin's long speech, who voiced his intention to "partially defend himself" independently, was devoted to violations during the investigation. The blogger claims that he was pressured and therefore admitted guilt under the article with which he now disagrees. He described one of the investigators in the case as a "drug addict and a Muslim," and also called others drug addicts. He also accused the investigator of refusing to fulfill his request and remove certain Chechens. "The Chechen looked at me aggressively and wanted to suppress me with this aggressive look," Shchepikhin said.

The blogger again stated that one of the three videos incriminated against him was not published. "They were removed from the archive of my personal Instagram* memory, they have zero views," Shchepikhin claimed. He later clarified that his account had already been blocked when the investigation discovered these videos. Later, Shchepikhin even stated that his social network account was "taken over" through a laptop or phone.

Shchepikhin also said that he was not allowed to read about half of his criminal case. In addition, he asked to present photos of "all seven kidnappers" for identification, and then "show them on central television so that everyone knows." The blogger later tried to hand over his recordings to Judge Abramova, but was unable to do so. Sotnikova's lawyer noted to him, that he will be able to hand over the recordings to the judge later.

The issue of changing the preventive measure was also discussed at the meeting. Areg Shchepikhin noted that detention is a “very severe preventive measure” and asked to be transferred to house arrest, stating that he “swears responsibly” not to break the law, not to threaten witnesses and not to destroy evidence. The blogger also referred to the fact that he has a young child and an elderly mother dependent on him. As possible places for serving house arrest, Shchepikhin named his aunt’s apartment in Khimki, where he was previously registered, “and for some reason deregistered before these events”, or the place of his current formal registration - a house in a village in the Voronezh region. Sotnikova’s lawyer supported this motion, but the prosecutor opposed it, stating that the grounds for a strict preventive measure had not changed. Judge Abramova supported the prosecution, leaving the preventive measure without changes.

After this, the presentation of evidence began: the prosecutor read out various fragments from the three-volume criminal case, which, in her opinion, should confirm the prosecution's position. Among other things, statements were read out from three residents of Chechnya - Aslambek Akhmetov, Ramzan Akhmatov and Delimkhan Magomedov - to the Chechen Ministry of Internal Affairs with complaints about Shchepikhin's videos and a statement that he insulted Allah. Search reports and expert opinions on the blogger's use of "obscene vocabulary that is absent from academic dictionaries of the modern Russian literary language" were also cited. The investigation's statement that all the videos were "extracted from the account" of Shchepikhin on Instagram* was also read out.

After the materials were read out, the prosecutor asked to postpone the hearing due to the failure of prosecution witnesses to appear. The next hearing is scheduled for 2:00 p.m. Moscow time on 29 September.

* the activities of the Meta company (which owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp) are prohibited in Russia.