"Shot the whole clip": how Navalny managed to avoid responsibility for a fight with the use of weapons in 2007

A fight near a nightclub in the center of Moscow, shooting at point-blank range and a bloody face of the victim, insulted on a national basis - RT publishes unique materials about how Alexei Navalny managed to avoid trial for hooliganism with the use of weapons in 2007. This story has regained relevance, since soon Navalny will probably have to stand trial on charges of defamation against WWII veteran Ignat Artyomenko, publicly branded a "lackey" and "traitor".

The events that will be discussed below took place 13 years ago - on October 30, 2007.

On that day, a political debate took place in the Moscow club "Gogol" on Stoleshnikov Lane. They were attended by State Duma candidate Maria Gaidar and writer Eduard Bagirov. The host was Alexey Navalny from Yabloko. By the time the event began at eight o'clock in the evening, the club, as its employees recalled, had gathered about 200 people. But that evening was not remembered for political discourse, but for the scuffle with shooting at the end of the debate.

The fight took place on the street, in front of the club entrance. Two people took part in it: a member of the Yabloko party Alexei Navalny and one of the club's visitors - Timur Teziev. As a result, as Teziev later testified, Navalny fired several times, practically point-blank, at him from a gas pistol.

Both were detained by the police, both wrote statements against each other. A criminal case was opened against Navalny. The investigation was closed and resumed several times until it was finally closed.

Search a woman

Navalny and his supporters, including Ilya Yashin (at that time the latter was a member of the Yabloko party), accused Teziev of the scandal. It was caused by Maria Gaidar.

From the affidavit of the administrator of the Gogol cafe Yevgeny Zhigulskikh: "During the" debate ", a young man with a beard (who was subsequently shot) went on stage, gave Gaidar a rose, congratulated her on her last birthday and expressed compliments to her."

According to Eduard Bagirov, Teziev's appearance on the stage with flowers took place after the end of the debate. It was this episode, he believes, that became the beginning of the conflict, since in 2007, according to rumors, Navalny and Gaidar had an affair.

“Everyone knows this. Of course, (they - RT ) met. Masha was generally very loving. I saw Navalny's face, he boiled. It can be understood, "Eduard Bagirov told RT.

From the testimony of Alexei Navalny: “I drew attention to the fact that in the hall to the left of the stage there is an aggressive group of drunken young people. They behaved defiantly, shouted obscene insults at me and the participants in the debates (in particular, M. Gaidar). They responded to calls to calm down with loud obscene language. "

After that, a conflict broke out between the two groups of visitors, someone doused someone with beer, someone threw a glass in response. However, there are several versions of who exactly started the squabble. Navalny and his supporters argued that Teziev and his comrades were the instigators.

From the testimony of Ilya Yashin: “Young people, including Teziev, behaved aggressively, provoked the audience and insulted the host of the debate, Navalny. In the final part of the debate, this group of young people staged a brawl with the audience, in which Teziev was an active participant. "

Navalny himself also testified that "these young people twice provoked a fight with other spectators."

“We inflicted several blows on those present,” he told the police. "One of them hit the guard over the head with a beer mug."

All this, added Navalny, "can be confirmed by at least 200 witnesses."

A hassle with beer

Teziev did not hide the fact that he came with friends to the club to "just talk and drink."

In his words, events developed as follows. After he gave Gaidar a flower and made a compliment, he returned to his friends at the table, and they continued to drink. But then Teziev felt bad, he went to the toilet. Returning, he decided to go out into the street to breathe and on the way noticed "that the people sitting in the hall stood up and shouted something."

One of Teziev's comrades, Mikhail Fedotov, later stated that other visitors had started the brawl at the club.

“When Timur was in the toilet, in the hall one of the visitors spilled a glass of beer on another, and he in turn threw a glass into him, after which the visitors got up and the hall became a little noisy,” he told the interrogators.

The Gogol waiter Ivan Kuzmenkov said that during the debate someone shouted from the audience: "Masha will be ours." The host (Navalny) asked him to calm down, but he "began to swear obscenely towards the host."

“At this time, someone poured liquid over the yelling guest from behind. He jumped up and began to look for the offender, - the witness recalled. - The security officer began to oust the troublemakers from the club. As soon as the latter was taken out of the establishment, the presenter left the stage and followed to the exit. "

The man, according to the waiter, was "dressed in sportswear and had a short haircut." Teziev was wearing a jumper and jeans.

From the testimony of the waiter Kuzmenkov: "The guest, who was subsequently beaten, behaved quite correctly in the hall during the debates, sat in silence and did not say anything incorrect to the host."

From the testimony of Andrei Lukyanchikov, administrator of the Gogol club: “During the debate, questions were asked from the audience and answers were received. At the end of the event, the host of the debate, Navalny, answered the questions, and then said to someone from the audience: "Let's talk on the street."

In turn, Teziev said that someone had simply pushed him out of the establishment. Turning around, he saw Navalny in front of him.

Bloody debate

From the testimony of Timur Teziev: “This citizen in a rude form asked me several questions of approximately the same content:“ who are you and what are you doing here ”. At the same time, he called me a "chock".

A verbal conflict ensued.

“He (Navalny - RT ) took out a pistol. I took a step back, and citizen Navalny started firing shots from a distance of about two meters, ”Teziev showed. - He shot the entire clip with a pneumatic pistol. He fired shots in the head area. I began to hide with my hands. "

When Navalny "ran out of balls," Timur Teziev "rushed at him and struck one blow to the head area."

“After that, two men, standing behind Navalny, threw me to the ground, started kicking me all over my body and head,” Teziev said.

In the police, Navalny claimed that during the conflict near the club, he first fired a warning shot in the air, and when this did not work, fired four shots at Teziev from about three meters, aiming at the body.

“No shots were fired in the head,” he said.

The outfit was summoned by Andrey Podushko, who was following the establishment. He saw that the gun was in the hands of a man dressed "in a brown jacket, black T-shirt, blue jeans." This is exactly what Navalny looked like that evening.

A detachment of an immediate response team that arrived at the scene brought both participants in the fight to the police department in the Tverskoy district "for investigation into what happened."

"Will be released in two hours"

An hour after the incident, Navalny wrote about the detention on his page in Live Journal (the author's spelling and punctuation are preserved): “Yes, ah,. in Gogol they are unlikely to agree to accept our debate again. "

“Don’t call - the phone is broken, I can’t calmly call my wife and mother, who are clearly freaking out from the radio messages about the shooting at the debates,” Navalny complained and reassured his subscribers: “For those who for some reason are sure that I have a hole in my head I report: there is no hole. "

The police, according to Navalny, were most interested in his "party affiliation." And he called Teziev "the devil."

“They will be released in two hours. They would have released me already, but for some reason this devil decided to write a statement against me, ”Alexey Navalny wrote in LiveJournal.

The gas pistol was seized from Navalny. It was the IZH-78-9T model. The examination confirmed: "The pistol is suitable for shooting." At the same time, Navalny received a license to carry weapons a little earlier than the incident - in August of the same year.

As a result of the fight, Navalny himself got off with an abrasion on his forehead, and the investigators did not consider such "bodily injuries" to be "harmful to health."

Teziev was diagnosed with another diagnosis: “A contused wound of the brow arch on the right. Injuries to the lower third of the left forearm, the left half of the chest from pneumatic weapons. Skin abrasions in the 7-11 ribs.

A few days after the incident, on November 2, 2007, the Department of Internal Affairs for the Tverskoy District of Moscow opened a criminal case under paragraph "a" of Part 1 of Art. 213 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (hooliganism with the use of weapons). On the same day it was canceled by the acting. Deputy Tver interdistrict prosecutor of the capital.

Gradually, the investigation fell apart. It was not without politics, but it was not the police who used this resource, as Navalny claimed in his LiveJournal, but his supporters.

Time heals?

The day after the incident, Nikita Belykh, the future governor of the Kirov region and Navalny's chief, and at that time the chairman of the Union of Right Forces party, turned to the police.

As the responsible head of the Department of Internal Affairs later reported to his superiors, this appeal was “about not giving a political coloring to the incident that happened”.

Soon, on November 7, the case with a hooligan article that threatened Navalny with up to five years in prison was re-qualified for beatings (Article 116 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), the maximum punishment for which is two years. Again, a decision was issued to initiate a criminal case and canceled on the same day.

In addition, the retraining meant that the investigation was no longer carried out on the initiative of law enforcement agencies, but became a private matter for Teziev and Navalny.

"This case (beatings. - RT ) is a private prosecution and procedurally it is initiated by the magistrate's court at the request of the victim, which, apparently, was not done," lawyer Alexei Maskaev commented on this situation to RT.

The Tver interdistrict prosecutor's office on November 12 extended the period of inquiry for a month. But on November 28, the victim's lawyer, Vladimir Gagloyev, turned to the OVD with a request to stop the inspection, since "Teziev has no claims against citizen Navalny at the moment."

The lawyer's statement became the basis for a new refusal to initiate a case against Navalny, which the Tverskoy District Department of Internal Affairs issued on November 29.

History repeated itself twice more. On December 17, the prosecutor's office sent the material to the OVD for additional verification, and on December 21, they again refused to initiate a case. The prosecutor's office made another attempt to resume the inquiry on January 9, 2008, but on January 18 the OVD issued another refusal.

With each new check, the veracity of the events that happened seemed less and less convincing. After the statement of Gagloyev's lawyer about the absence of claims against Navalny, the police could no longer find Teziev for a new examination. And the injuries identified earlier were considered harmless to life. According to the final decision on refusal to initiate proceedings, they also did not lead to a short-term disorder of health and disability.

“If Teziev does not have any bodily injuries as a result of the shooting, then it is difficult to prove that he suffered from the shots. Probably, the very fact of the use of traumatic weapons is ambiguous. It turned out that everything was just words, ”says lawyer Alexey Maskaev.

Lawyer Vladimir Gagloyev told RT that after so many years he no longer remembers all the details of this story, but he is sure that his client "did not want any litigation and litigation."

“As far as I remember, Teziev was not eager to write a statement and contact law enforcement agencies,” said the victim's defender.

"In connection with the propaganda of nationalist ideas"

As for Navalny's party affiliation, he lost it in December of the same year. But not on the initiative of the police.

Let us remind you that Alexei Navalny applied to join the Yabloko party back in 2000. In early 2007, he was a member of the party's federal council and served as chief of staff for the Moscow-based Yabloko.

"He (Navalny. - RT) was kicked out, expelled from Yabloko for nationalism," said the party's press secretary Igor Yakovlev. - It was not about statements, but about participation in nationalist projects and "Russian marches".

Yakovlev provided RT with a copy of the decision to expel Navalny from the Yabloko RDP, signed by party leader Grigory Yavlinsky.

"In connection with the propaganda of nationalist ideas, which causes political damage to the Party, in accordance with clause 8.6.4 of the Party's Charter, to exclude Alexei Anatolyevich Navalny from the YABLOKO Party members," the document says.

But this, apparently, did not greatly affect Navalny, who claims to be the president of a multinational country.

Recently, Navalny's xenophobic remarks about Jews and Poles were widely discussed online.

The derogatory remarks were published on his page in LiveJournal two years after the events described above. In his blog, Navalny called the Jews "Jews" and offered to "warm them up with the guilds."

Now Navalny is being accused in a libel case against 93-year-old WWII veteran Ignat Artyomenko, whom he has publicly called a "traitor" and a "lackey".

Libel is considered a minor offense. These include those criminal offenses for which the maximum sentence does not exceed three years in prison (and for libel, only a fine or compulsory work is threatened). This means that if, two years after the commission of such an offense, a sentence is not passed against the accused and does not come into force, he will be released from criminal liability.