The former police major was sentenced to 8 years in prison for posting about the war in Ukraine

A court in Moscow sentenced retired police major Oleg Kashintsev in absentia to eight years in prison under the article about fakes about the Russian army. This was reported by the lawyer of the Network Freedom project.

Also, Kashintseva was forbidden to administer social networks and work in law enforcement agencies for four years, and he was also deprived of the rank of police major. Kashintsev left Russia a few months ago – this is the first absentee sentence on the article about fakes, “Network Freedoms” note.

According to the court decision, in the spring of 2022 Kashintsev posted several posts on Telegram and Instagram in which he called the war in Ukraine a war and claimed that the Russian military was killing, interrogating and raping peaceful Ukrainians, as well as looting. In addition, Kashintsev wrote that Russia intends to seize Ukrainian territories. The court considered it fake.

The Russian authorities declared Kashintsev on the international wanted list, but Interpol recognized the persecution of the activist as political and refused to extradite him.

Kashintsev worked for 18 years in the Rybinsk police of the Yaroslavl region, 14 of them in criminal investigation. Against the background of protests demanding that independent politicians be admitted to the Moscow City Duma elections, he resigned. In December 2021, Kashintsev went to Red Square with a poster “Freedom to Navalny. Putin is a killer.”

• An article about fakes about the Russian army was added to the Criminal Code of Russia shortly after the start of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
• The Russian authorities call any information about the war in Ukraine, different from the version of the Ministry of Defense of Russia, fake. According to the criminal article on spreading fakes, he faces up to 15 years in prison.
• According to the General Prosecutor’s Office, 187 cases have already been initiated under the article on fakes.