53 people have already become defendants in the FBK case

At least 53 people have been accused in criminal cases related to the Anti-Corruption Fund (FBK), “Kholod” calculated. Probably, in reality, there are more accused. Journalists of the publication collected only those cases, information about which was published in mass media.

Cases related to the work of FBK have been stirring since 2021, when the fund founded by Alexei Navalny was recognized by the Russian authorities as an extremist organization.

According to Kholod, 18 of the 53 defendants have already been convicted. 19 people managed to leave Russia before being detained; almost all of them were arrested in absentia or declared wanted. 16 people are awaiting sentencing. Twelve of them are in pre-trial detention centers, one is under recognizance, another is at large with an obligation to appear, the procedural status of the two is unknown. All of them face a real deadline. Most of the accused in the “extremist case” of the FBK are included in the list of terrorists and extremists, their bank accounts have been blocked.

Some of them are accused of participating in extremist activities. Employees of the disbanded FBK and former coordinators of Navalny’s headquarters in different cities were charged with organizing an extremist community (organization, unlike participation, carries a harsher sentence). Another part of people are accused of financing extremist activities for donations to FBK.

The most criminal cases (20) were initiated in 2023. Then they continued to detain Alexei Navalny’s lawyers and people who tipped off the FBK, as well as random people whose connection with the FBK structures is not obvious, and the detainees themselves deny it.

In three months of 2024, the charges against FBK’s “extremist case” have already been brought against nine people: among them are regional activists, people who donated to FBK, Navalny’s lawyer, two former employees of FBK, and journalist Antonina Favorskaya.

At the same time, according to Favorskaya’s support group, the journalist was never a member of the FBK, but only covered the courts in criminal cases against Alexei Navalny and actions in memory of the politician.

“The FBK case is a root case, like the Yukos case in its time. New cases can be drawn from it for many years. The probability of this scenario is high, judging by the fact that Navalny’s death did not stop the process. The potential in the case is great,” says a human rights activist who is familiar with in the case of FBK, who spoke to Kholod on the condition of anonymity.

According to lawyer and human rights activist Ivan Pavlov, the task of the authorities is to intimidate. “For this, it is not necessary to put a lot of people behind bars. It will be enough to sentence a few, but noticeable ones. Independent mass media will bring the information to the target audience – thus an effect will be achieved, similar to if these repressions were mass,” Pavlov told the publication.