On all counts: a court in the United States found Russian Evgeny Nikulin guilty of cybercrime

In the United States, the jury found Russian Evgeny Nikulin guilty of cybercrime. Nikulin was found guilty of all nine counts of the charges against him, RIA Novosti reported.

The verdict to the Russian is planned to be announced on September 29 in San Francisco. Nikulin’s defense intends to appeal, Russian lawyer Arkady Bukh told TASS.

“We definitely appeal. Already have an agreement with the family. Great injustice happened, ”the lawyer emphasized.

He specified that the psychiatrist appointed by Nikulin as a court had earlier recognized Nikulin as "mentally abnormal." “Probably, there will be some additional arguments,” the lawyer added, noting that up to 60 days are allotted for the appeal.

Recall that Yevgeny Nikulin was detained in Prague on October 5, 2016 on suspicion of organizing cyber attacks on the websites of American companies in 2012.

In the case file, published by the federal prosecutor's office of the Northern District of California, it is noted that a hacker under the nicknames Chinabig01, dex.007, valery.krutov3 and itBlackHat in March 2012 hacked the LinkedIn social network databases, infecting the computer of one of the employees. The consequence of this activity was the theft of 117 million passwords, which is about a quarter of the total.

Later, in May – July 2012, according to the prosecution, the young man hacked Dropbox in a similar way. In June and July of the same year, the Formspring service was used, and the case says that in the latter case, Nikulin allegedly did not act alone. The names of the other suspects are not indicated, but in the case file they are indicated as “Comemban No. 1”, “Comemban No. 2” and “Comemban No. 3”.

It was noted that the charges against Nikulin did not imply the possibility of a bail. According to the allegations, the Russian citizen could face tens of years of imprisonment and a fine of up to $ 1 million. Along with this, Nikulin is also accused by the Russian side of stealing more than 100 thousand rubles from electronic wallets of citizens in 2009.

In the course of the proceedings, Nikulin’s defense pointed out that for crimes incriminated to a Russian citizen, the maximum sentence under Czech law is eight years in prison, according to Russian - 10, and according to American - 54 years.

In March 2018, Czech authorities extradited Nikulin to the American side. The flight to the USA took place on a special board of the US Department of Justice. At the same time, Prague did not notify Nikulin's lawyers or diplomatic representatives about this. Subsequently, Washington notified Moscow of the extradition of the Russian to Moscow.

The Russian Foreign Ministry expressed outrage at this move by the Czech authorities. The foreign ministry indicated that the Czech side, taking this decision, was guided by "not legal norms, but the desire to once again demonstrate the" allied loyalty "elevated ... to the rank of absolute priority.

The Foreign Ministry also emphasized that the Czech Republic ignored the official request of the Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation to extradite Nikulin to Russia. In addition, the situation was then voiced by Russian Ambassador to the Czech Republic Alexander Zmeevsky.

“We regard the incident as a conscious politically motivated step by the Czech side aimed at undermining the constructive basis of bilateral cooperation with Russia,” RIA Novosti quoted Zmeyevsky as saying.

He added that, according to his information, the special board of the US Department of Justice was waiting at the Prague airport a few days before the court decision. The diplomat suggested that "the American partners were deliberately informed about the upcoming decision of the Constitutional Court of the Czech Republic and the subsequent verdict of the Czech Minister of Justice."

Subsequently, Czech President Milos Zeman also criticized the decision to transfer Nikulin to the United States. “Mr. Nikulin is a Russian citizen, and Russia demanded his extradition. I consider it more natural for him to be extradited to his country, ”Zeman said.

According to him, the approval of Nikulin’s extradition was not the responsibility of the officials who made the corresponding decision.

Subsequently, the Czech Constitutional Court upheld the complaint about the illegal extradition of the Russian Russian Evgeny Nikulin to the United States.

“Former Czech Minister of Justice Robert Pelikan, who decided to extradite a Russian citizen to the United States, violated the rights of Yevgeny Nikulin,” TASS quoted a judge of the Czech Constitutional Court, Radovan Sukhanek.