In the Russian Federation, since the beginning of the year, the courts have received more than 2,000 “self-wolf” cases

Since the beginning of 2023, Russian courts have received 2,076 criminal cases of involuntary abandonment. This is already twice as much as for the entire last year, Mediazona calculated.

By June, military courts in Russia were handing out 100 sentences every week under the article on the involuntary abandonment of a unit or place of service. Most of those convicted under this article are mobilized, the publication notes.

Earlier, as the journalists noticed, most of the defendants received suspended sentences. According to recent estimates, such a sentence is handed down in more than half of cases. However, now the mobilized get a real term more often than contract workers. As a result, the courts rarely return to the front mobilized men who escaped from the service, notes “Mediazona”.

On June 29, it became known about one of the harshest sentences for deserting a military unit – a man mobilized from Primorye was given nine years for three escapes from the service.

• In September 2022, Vladimir Putin signed a law on amendments to the Criminal Code, which increased prison terms for leaving the post of service in the conditions of hostilities and mobilization to ten years of imprisonment. The first criminal case was initiated in December 2022 in Murmansk.