6 people released on bail in Moscow with 11 thousand arrested in pre-trial detention

Now in Moscow six people have been released from a pre-trial detention center on bail, said Eva Merkacheva, a member of the Human Rights Council under the President of Russia (HRC). According to her, the investigation released them on bail not in 2022, but earlier. Meanwhile, there are 11,000 people in Moscow pre-trial detention centers. At the same time, the capital’s isolation wards are designed to hold 9,000 prisoners.

“Today in Moscow, there are 6 suspects and defendants on bail… But these 6 did not even appear this year, they had previously chosen such a measure of restraint. In general, it’s amazing. On bail 6, and under arrest in a pre-trial detention center almost 11 thousand,” Ms. Merkacheva wrote in Telegram. The head of the HRC expressed her hope that “the courts will finally start releasing people on bail.”

The deposit is regulated by art. 106 Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation. As a measure of restraint, he is appointed by a court decision for a period of up to two months. In criminal cases of small and medium gravity, the amount of bail cannot be less than 50 thousand rubles. In the case of grave and especially grave crimes – at least 500 thousand rubles. The upper threshold is not defined.

Russian courts rarely apply this measure of restraint. Moreover, the share of bail among other preventive measures is declining from year to year and by February 2022 amounted to less than 0.2% on average. So, in 2020, the courts chose a measure of restraint in the form of bail 244 times, and released during the court session with bail 6 times. In 2010, the bail was elected 629 times. The largest pledge in Russia is 55 million rubles. was introduced on October 28, 2011 to the Ostankinsky Court of Moscow for the former First Deputy General Director of the Tretyakov Gallery Oleg Belikov. Two years later, he was sentenced to five years for fraud on an especially large scale.

At the same time, Moscow pre-trial detention centers suffer from overcrowding. By information Commissioner for Human Rights in Moscow Tatyana Potyaeva, the excess of the number of arrested persons held in Moscow pre-trial detention centers in 2022 amounted to 22.6%. Last year, the “overshoot” was 11%. In December 2021, Georgy Volkov, chairman of the Moscow Public Monitoring Commission (POC), noted that due to overcrowding in Moscow pre-trial detention centers, people are being sent to the regions to wait for an appeal.

In other regions, there is also a problem of overcrowding in detention facilities. As Kommersant previously wrote, the Federal Penitentiary Service admits that about a quarter of Russian pre-trial detention centers are experiencing a “overlimit” of prisoners.

Why pre-trial detention centers are overcrowded – in the publication “Kommersant” “Nowhere to sit”.

Anastasia Larina