Russia sentences lawyers of late opposition figure Navalny to prison

Three lawyers for Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in an Arctic prison camp just under a year ago, were sentenced to prison Friday, highlighting the risks of having any ties to the opposition in Russia, even in a professional lawyer-client relationship.

Vadim Kobzev, Igor Sergunin and Alexei Lipster were sentenced after being convicted on extremism charges in Petushinsky District Court in the Vladimir region.

Kobzev received 5½ years in prison; Liptser was given 5 years; and Sergunin, who pleaded guilty, received 3½ years. They also were barred from practicing law for three years after their release from prison.

Navalny’s lead lawyer, Olga Mikhailova, was outside the country when police arrested the others in October 2023, but her office was raided, and she was charged in absentia with extremism.

Four journalists and one other person who attended the court hearing were detained by police before the sentencing, the Mediazona independent media outlet reported, but they were released later after their documents were recorded.

Lipster told journalists after the sentencing, “What can you say? Everything is expected,” according to Mediazona. Kobzev thanked the dozens of journalists and supporters who attended.

Other lawyers for Navalny or representing Russian journalists and dissidents have been forced to flee the country to avoid arrest. They include another Navalny lawyer, Alexander Fedulov, who was charged in absentia with extremism, and Ivan Pavlov, one of Russia’s most prominent human rights lawyers, who is known for taking on sensitive political cases. He fled in 2021 to avoid arrest and was later charged in absentia with failing to comply with Russia’s foreign agents legislation.

The three lawyers were accused of participating in an extremist community by passing Navalny’s writings and letters to his supporters outside prison. Prosecutors argued that because Navalny’s prison writings were published, he “continued to perform the functions of the leader and director of an extremist community.”

The trial was closed to the media and public after Russia’s Center for Combating Extremism, a wing of the Ministry of Internal Affairs that largely combats political dissent, claimed to have intelligence that Navalny’s supporters were planning “provocations” at the trial and nearby. The sentencing itself was accessible, but few journalists and members of the public were able to enter the small courtroom, according to Mediazona.

Navalny, who was serving a 19-year sentence when he died, had faced multiple cases including embezzlement, fraud, disrespecting a veteran, promoting extremism and promoting terrorism. After his imprisonment, his trials were held inside prisons, with media corralled into a separate room to watch the case via video feeds with distorted sound and sudden cuts to the transmission.

Left unrepresented in court after the arrest of his lawyers, Navalny protested in an Oct. 17, 2023, hearing: “I don’t understand what’s going on. My lawyer is not here. All the other lawyers are not here. Nobody is allowed to visit me. I am isolated and cut off from any information.” He said he had been denied the right to a radio.

After Navalny died on Feb. 16, 2024, at age 47, Yulia Navalnaya accused Russian authorities of murdering her husband. Russian prison authorities refused for days to release the body, and no independent forensic analysis could be carried out.

Last February, Vasily Dubkov, the lawyer who represented Navalny’s mother, Lyudmila Navalnaya, in her struggle to recover his body from Russian authorities, was also detained briefly in Moscow.

Days later, thousands of Russians thronged to Navalny’s funeral, and although police barriers prevented his supporters from entering the church for the service, they left a mountain of flowers on his grave.

In August last year, Yulia Navalnaya released a statement that she had been officially informed by Russian authorities that her husband’s death was “not of a criminal character” but was caused by “a combined disease.” Navalnaya called the statement “a lie,” adding that the family’s lawyers had filed suit for examination and autopsy results; medical documents; and video recordings from Navalny’s cell, the exercise yard and the prison’s medical department. The information was denied, she said.

The Insider, an investigative outlet, published dozens of official documents last year indicating that Navalny suffered sharp stomach pain and vomiting before his death. These references were removed from later official documents.

The Insider also published an official inventory of items seized from Navalny’s cell, including his vomit, his mattress, bedding, soap, journals, books and personal items.

The story of Navalny’s time in prison, his 2020 poisoning by the Russian state, and his life and political views is told in his memoir “Patriot,” based partly on his prison diary.

Navalny died as negotiations were underway for a prisoner swap that would have exchanged Navalny, American journalist Evan Gershkovich and former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan for Vadim Krasikov, a Russian assassin who was imprisoned in Germany after being convicted of killing a man in Berlin on orders from the Russian state.