A resident of Derbent was fined for a comment about a police officer

The Derbent City Court fined local resident Ibrahim Tajibov 30,000 rubles for a comment under a video with a police officer on Instagram**.

Tajibov was charged under the article on the dissemination of information on the internet that expresses clear disrespect for society, the state, official state symbols, the Constitution, or government authorities (part 3 of article 20.1 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of Russia). This article provides for a fine of 30,000 to 100,000 rubles.

The reason for the prosecution of the resident of Dagestan was a comment containing the words "coward in epaulettes." The ruling on Tajibov's case was noted by "Mediazona"*.

The comment was identified on June 29 by employees of the Center for Countering Extremism of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Dagestan. It was published in the news channel aggressor.713, which in July published a video about a conflict with a police officer under an obscene headline. "Coward in epaulettes, go out like a man, face him one-on-one, cowards hide behind epaulettes," the comment is quoted in the ruling on the court's website.

The protocol against Ibrahim Tajibov was drawn up on July 25 by the senior police officer of the Department of Internal Affairs of Derbent. The court believes that Tajibov's guilt is confirmed by the protocol, the report of the operational officer of the Center for Countering Extremism with attached screenshots of the comment, and the report of the operational officer of the criminal investigation department.

In court, Tajibov admitted his guilt and expressed remorse. The court considered the admission of guilt and remorse as mitigating circumstances. In imposing a penalty at the lower limit of the sanction, Judge Ramazanova noted that "the case materials do not contain information about the occurrence of any harmful consequences, and this offense did not lead to mass riots or other serious threats to public safety."

"Caucasian Knot" also reported that a court in Nalchik fined Kirill Kotlyarov 30,000 rubles in May, considering his comments on Telegram to be discrediting the army.

* included in the Russian register of foreign agents.

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