Parents of many children were given an unreasonably harsh preventive measure, sent to a pre-trial detention center

The Moscow City Court recently recognized as lawful and justified the arrest of a mother of many children, teacher Olga Raslina and her husband, respectively, also a father of many children, lawyer Viktor Raslin (accused of an economic crime). Unjustified cruelty, and seemingly based on strict observance of the law.

It is unlikely that the story of the Ruslins is an exception to the rule. In one of the cells where women suspected of non-violent crimes were kept, I asked those who had two or more young children to raise their hands. I’ll tell you something terrible: there was a forest of hands.

“Why don’t mom and dad pick me up from kindergarten? They abandoned me?!” arranges a tantrum baby, who is 5 years old.

“Mum! Mum! Ma! – shouts brother, who is 4 years old. He is disabled and “mom” is the only word he has learned to pronounce.

“Mum? Dad? And what are they? Will they come to me soon?” asks the youngest, who is only two years old and who hardly remembers his parents, but is already a great chatterer.

The story of the detention of parents with many children accused of a non-violent crime is monstrous in itself. After all, Russian legislation guards the interests of children, and even for those mothers whom the court found guilty, it provides a respite. How it looks in practice: let’s say a woman was assigned 6 years in a colony, but they immediately gave a deferral of punishment until the child reaches 14 years of age.

“Of course, I gave mothers a lot of reprieve,” this is how the judges I interviewed responded to me (on condition of anonymity). I was told several stories where even women found guilty of murder received a reprieve. The judge reasoned something like this: if a woman is adequate, and she is a good mother, then the interests of the child should be observed in the first place.

In general, the law on deferment was not born from scratch. Wise people in power came to the conclusion that restoring the health (including mental) of children forcibly deprived of their parents is too costly (and not always predictable) for the state and society. Simply put, whenever possible, it is better to leave the child with at least one of the parents.

And it is all the more surprising when they are taken into custody at the stage of investigation, that is, those who are not even found guilty.

I learned about the history of Olga Raslina from her. More precisely, it was like this: during an inspection of one of the cells of the women’s pre-trial detention center No. 6, where suspects of economic crimes are sitting, the prisoners pushed a small woman forward with the words: “Tell me!”. She started talking about the children she had… five, including four minors! It seems to me that a mother of many children can be taken into custody only if she has killed someone, if she poses a threat to her children. But nothing like that. Olga taught all her life, was an adviser to one of the departments. Her entire “threat” lies in the fact that she does not give the confessions necessary for the investigation (and the case is being conducted by the central apparatus of the Investigative Committee, even when accompanied by special services).

And then the court also arrested Olga’s husband. Both parents are in jail. The children were divided among the grandmothers. And here is how older women describe their condition.

“When my mother was imprisoned, the youngest was a year and three months old,” says the grandmother. – We recently celebrated his birthday – two years old. He barely remembers his parents. He learned to speak, and very well, and all the time he asks about them: “Where are they? When will they arrive?” We come up with different versions, but the heart shrinks … And the disabled boy, who is 4 years old, can only say one word: “mother.” And he calls his mother from morning to evening! Olga has been treating him since birth. Of course, I do my best, but I cannot replace her. There are medical documents that say that he is very attached to his mother, that after parting his condition worsened and a “point of no return” may come.

“The girl, who is five, assured herself that mom and dad stopped loving her and left her,” says another grandmother. – She cannot understand why they suddenly stopped living with her, they no longer take her from kindergarten. “Grandma, it’s good with you, but I love mom and dad very much and I want to be with them! Why did they leave me? Am I bad?” she says. We cannot explain to the child that the parents are in prison. Every day the girl cries… There is no strength to look at it.

The eldest girl, who is already 13 years old, is also having a hard time with the arrest. It would seem that he understands everything, he can cope. But no. The teenage girl began to have severe health problems caused by stress amid the arrest of her parents.

Once again: 2, 4, 5 and 13 years old is the age of the underage children of the Raslins. They are not suspected of anything and have not committed any atrocities. But the state, represented by the investigation and the court, punished them in a way that the worst criminals are not punished. Both of their parents were taken from them.

“There was great hope for an appeal,” says the lawyer. – When they chose a measure of restraint for Olga, dad was still at large. And the Presnensky court considered that since one parent remains with the children, then she can be arrested. But then, after all, they took dad into custody, moreover, in the same court. It turns out that the previous argument no longer works. But the appeal considered that everything was correct.

The prosecutor (by the way, a woman, and probably also a mother) stated that, having remained at large, Raslina could hide (with young children?) And put pressure on the investigation (on the Investigative Committee and the FSB?).

The court of appeal left Raslina and her husband under arrest. Let me remind you that a little earlier, the same court of appeal recognized as lawful the arrest of a sick suspect in embezzlement, who, by the time of the trial, had already died three days ago in a cell …

Chairman of the TFR Alexander Bastrykin has said so many times that he stands guard over childhood. But how does he feel about the fact that his subordinates demand that both parents of underage children be arrested before sentencing?

I ask you to consider this publication an official appeal to the chairman of the Moscow City Court and the chairman of the TFR.