What ended the Pussy Riot case

At the first meeting, the most interesting issue for all was the extension of the expiring period of detention of accused in a pre-trial detention center – insisted on it charge. The prosecutor’s office motivated the extension of the sentence by allowing the defendants to abscond. Not all of them have registration, permanent work in Moscow, and those registered do not live at the place of registration. Defenders asked to release the girls under the surety of various famous personalities, whom 53 persons appeared in the list of lawyers, but only seven were present in court. The court decided this issue in favor of the prosecutors – the detention period was extended for six months, until 12 January 2013.

The main result of the second session was the announcement of the date of the commencement of the case on the merits – the court set it for July 30 In addition, the request of lawyers to subpoena some thirty additional witnesses and experts, including the President of Russia and the Primate of the Russian Orthodox Church, was rejected. The situation in which both sessions took place proved calm enough – supporters and opponents of Pussy Riot gathered outside the court were not aggressive. Perhaps that is why journalists’ interest in the second meeting plummeted.

Pussy Riot – “Vagina Riot” – a female punk rock band formed in the summer of 2011, with no permanent line-up of members. The band received notoriety not by their songs, but by venues of public actions – Moscow Metro, Red Square, pre-trial detention center, etc. Participants consider illegality and provocative nature of their speeches necessary, so there is nothing unexpected about the detention. The arrest took place after an action in the altar of the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour, which the participants called “punk molebal”. In the criminal case initiated on February 26, 2012, this action was classified as hooliganism. On March 3 Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina were detained, who stated that Pussy Riot and actions in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior have no relation. On March 16 Yekaterina Samutsevich was added to the number of detainees. The criminal case against the other participants of the action is allocated in separate proceedings, and their names are either unknown to the investigation, or simply are not announced. Members of the group can be sentenced for up to 7 years for disorderly conduct. However, there was a negative mention of Putin in the text “punk molebna”, so the public resonance simple hooliganism received as a riot against the system and took on political coloring.