Lawyers considered the overturning of Diana Tsipinova's acquittal unfair.

The Cassation Court has again overturned the acquittal of Kabardino-Balkaria lawyer Diana Tsipinova in the case of assaulting a security officer, and the case has been remanded for a new trial. The court sided with the prosecution's position, which lacks evidence, the defense stated.

As reported by "Caucasian Knot," the Deputy Prosecutor General filed a cassation appeal against the second acquittal of lawyer Diana Tsipinova, insisting she is guilty of assaulting a police officer. The prosecutor's office is challenging the facts established by the courts, which falls outside the scope of the cassation review, the defense stated. Earlier, on February 20, the Supreme Court of Kabardino-Balkaria rejected the prosecutor's request to review the case of Diana Tsipinova, accused of assaulting a security officer, and upheld the repeated acquittal.

The Cassation Court remanded Tsipinova's case for a new trial

On June 25, the Fifth Cassation Court, having considered the arguments of the parties, upheld the cassation appeal of the Prosecutor General's Office, overturning the acquittal and the appellate ruling. The criminal case against Diana Tsipinova has been sent back to the lower court for a new trial, according to the Advocate Newspaper.

16:53 19.02.2026

The Tsipinova case has become an example of the prosecutor's abuse of the right to appeal.

The prosecution, unlike the defense, can initiate repeated rounds of case proceedings until a guilty verdict is reached or until procedural options are exhausted. The prosecutor's office is exploiting this bias in the Tsipinova case, the lawyers noted.

Earlier, in their objections to the prosecution's cassation appeal, the defense noted that Diana Tsipinova's return to the police station to retrieve her phone, which had not been legally seized and was of material and other value to her, including due to the presence of information constituting attorney-client privilege in the phone's memory, could not be deemed unlawful. The police officers had no grounds for denying Diana Tsipinova access to her property. Therefore, Timur Nagoyev's actions, in using physical force against the lawyer, which did not pose a threat to the life and health of citizens or police officers and whose actions could not have led to other serious consequences, were committed without compliance with the requirements of Article 19 of the Law on Police. The defense emphasized that the court rightly considered that Diana Tsipinova might not have realized that Timur Nagoyev was a government official, as his appearance (uniform) and behavior did not match that of a police officer. During the trial, the prosecution also failed to present credible evidence that Timur Nagoyev identified himself to Diana Tsipinova as a police officer prior to using force against her. On the contrary, as video footage confirms, he did not inform the visiting lawyers of his rank as deputy chief of the police department, his 24-hour duty, or the possibility of using force if she failed to comply. The defendant also could not see the details of his clothing due to the time of day and the victim's position.

According to the defense, the argument regarding the inconsistencies in the verdict is also unfounded. An analysis of the verdict reveals that the cases deal with different episodes and time periods: in the first instance, the court examines Diana Tsipinova's actions in returning to the police station to retrieve a cell phone that had not been lawfully confiscated, while in the second, it analyzes the actions of the lawyers, including Diana Tsipinova, after being denied access to her client. "The author of the cassation appeal failed to take into account the chronology and circumstances of the events, which is why he mistakenly perceived a contradiction in the court's findings," the objections stated.

The defense will challenge the cassation court's decision

Member of the Bar Association of Stavropol Krai Suren Natanov reported that the trial was conducted in an adversarial manner.

The defense intends to continue to defend justice

"However, the cassation court sided with the prosecution, whose arguments are not supported by the factual circumstances of the criminal case. The defense intends to continue to defend justice. After a detailed study of the reasoning of the cassation ruling, a cassation appeal will be prepared for submission to the Judicial Collegium for Criminal Cases of the Supreme Court," he noted. he.

"The legal community will not accept or agree with this judicial decision, and Diana Tsipinova will go down in history as twice legally acquitted," the publication quotes Nver Gasparyan, Vice President of the Federal Chamber of Advocates (FPA) of the Russian Federation and Deputy Chairman of the Commission of the Council of the FPA of the Russian Federation for the Protection of the Rights of Advocates, who is also defending Diana Tsipinova.

"This is how we treat acquittals if the case is brought against a lawyer," Svetlana Volodina, President of the FPA of the Russian Federation, told the publication.

What is Diana Tsipinova accused of?

In May 2020, Diana Tsipinova was among three lawyers who volunteered to provide legal assistance to her colleague Ratmir Zhilokov after his arrest in Nartkala. They arrived at the police station and were unable to get access to Zhilokov for 40 minutes. The security forces disapproved of the lawyers filming and violently ejected them from the building. The use of force against lawyers in Kabardino-Balkaria and their subsequent criminal prosecution is considered extraordinary by the professional community, although it is not an isolated incident. Violations of the right to legal representation pose a potential threat to every citizen, according to lawyers interviewed by the "Caucasian Knot."

On July 7, 2023, the Urvan District Court, having heard the case for the first time, found no criminal offense in Diana Tsipinova's actions and acquitted her. The Supreme Court of Kabardino-Balkaria upheld the verdict, but the cassation court in Pyatigorsk upheld the prosecutor's office's demands and remanded the case for a new trial. The cassation ruling is clearly incriminating; the court exceeded its authority in assessing the evidence and its credibility, Tsipinova's defense attorney stated.

On December 1, 2025, the Urvan District Court, which retried the case, again acquitted Tsipinova. However, the prosecution had requested a 2.5-year sentence in a penal colony.

The prosecutor's office also challenged the second acquittal, demanding that the case be remanded for a new trial. The appellate court, the Supreme Court of Kabardino-Balkaria, reviewed video footage from the scene of the incident at the police station and again upheld the acquittal. The court rarely sides with the defense, the lawyers noted, only when egregious violations are evident.