Moskalyov Aleksey Vladimirovich

On April 24, 2022, in the city of Efremov in the Tula region, a teacher asked her class to draw pictures in support of Russian troops in Ukraine during an art lesson. Twelve-year-old fifth-grader Maria Moskalyova drew the Russian and Ukrainian flags—the first with the words “No to war” and the second with “Glory to Ukraine”—with a woman and child standing in the middle, missiles flying toward them from Russia. Upon seeing the drawing, the teacher ran to the principal, who called the police. The art teacher immediately threatened Masha that the police would deal with her, so when the officers arrived and waited for Masha at the entrance, asking all the children for their first and last names, she immediately understood what was going on. On her way out, she gave a false name and managed to run away home. According to her father, Alexei Moskalyov, she came home breathless and very frightened and told her father that the police had not caught her because she had “drawn a picture.” Masha was afraid to go to school the next day, but her father promised that he would take her himself and wait until the end of classes. On April 25, Alexei, as promised, went with Masha to school and sat there for about two hours when the school principal came out into the hallway, saw Alexei, and immediately called the police—this time, child protective services arrived with the police. Masha was taken out of class, led into the hallway, and shown the drawing. The police took statements from everyone on the spot, after which Alexei and his daughter were escorted out of the school, put in a police car, and taken to the police station. At the police station, Alexei Moskalyov was interrogated by the police chief, Andrei Aksenov, who lectured him on “raising his child incorrectly.” Masha waited for her father in another room. On Alexei's pages on Odnoklassniki and VKontakte, the police found comments in support of Ukraine and pictures with caricatures of Vladimir Putin. Moskalev was charged with “public actions aimed at discrediting the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.” The trial took place on the same day. Alexei was fined 32,000 rubles for a comment on Odnoklassniki: “The Russian army. Rapists are among us.” The trial ended in the evening. Masha was hungry and tearful, and she was shaking. Alexei tried to calm her down, telling her that since the trial had taken place and he had been fined, they would now leave them alone and that everything was over. Masha told her father that she was afraid to go to school. But Alexei convinced his daughter that there was nothing to worry about anymore. The next day, April 26, Masha went to class. Soon, the principal called her father and told him that he needed to come to the school urgently because FSB officers had come for Masha. When Alexei rushed to the school, he was met by FSB officers. When he asked where his daughter was, they told him she was in the next room, being interviewed. After that, Alexei was also “interviewed”: for three and a half hours, they told him that he was raising his daughter wrong. They threatened to take his daughter away and put him in jail. Alexei was also offered the opportunity for Masha to lead a youth group in support of Russian troops, but Alexei politely declined, saying that she had many classes and clubs and no time for such activities. After that, Masha stopped going to school. According to Alexei, as soon as he mentioned school to Masha, she would start hysterically crying and begging her father not to take her to school anymore. For eight months, security forces closely monitored Alexei Moskalev's social media accounts, and on December 30, at seven in the morning, they raided the Moskalevs' home. Alexei Moskalyov described the search as a pogrom: security forces took things out of the closets and threw them on the floor, trampled on clothes, pulled out cords, tore pictures off the walls, and overturned furniture. They found the money that Alexei and Masha lived on—125,000 rubles and $3,150. Moskalev says that this was all his savings: until 2000, he was an entrepreneur, and then he raised ornamental birds. The money was confiscated, along with all documents and equipment: a computer, mobile phones, even old push-button phones. They photographed Masha's drawing with the inscription “Glory to Ukraine!”. After the search, Moskalyov was taken for questioning to the FSB, and his daughter was taken to a “social institution.” A criminal case was opened against Alexei for repeated “discrediting of the troops.” Moskalev recalls how during the interrogation they beat him “with his head against the wall and floor” and showed him Masha's comment on a post about how Russian soldiers “die without sparing their lives”: “And how much are they dying for - two hundred thousand a month or a little more?” In the afternoon, Alexei was locked in an office for two and a half hours, the Russian anthem was played at full volume so that “the walls shook,” and then they left. Alexei had a heart attack. The police were frightened and called an ambulance. The doctors measured his blood pressure, gave him two pills, gave him an injection, and left. Alexei was released only at nine in the evening. He was handed a summons to appear at the police station on January 9, 2023. They returned his passport. They promised to return the rest, including his daughter's birth certificate, “tomorrow” at 11 a.m., and to go with him to pick up Masha at the same time. The next morning, no one came, and Alexei picked up his daughter from the shelter himself, after which he left Yefremov with her. On March 1, 2023, Alexei Moskalyov was detained by police officers on his way to work and taken home, where his daughter was. Masha was told that her father was being taken to the police station and that a juvenile affairs commission would come for her. Alexei was taken to the Yefremov Investigative Committee, and Masha was placed in the Yunost rehabilitation center (address: 41A Stroiteley Street, Yefremov, Tula Region, Russia). The next day, March 2, 2023, the Yefremov District Court of the Tula Region placed Alexei Moskalyov under house arrest until March 27. On March 3, the investigator handling Alexei Moskalyov's case came to the shelter to pick up Masha and take her to her father, but he was refused. It turned out that the Commission on Juvenile Affairs of the Yefremov City Administration (Tula Region) had filed a lawsuit with the court to restrict Alexei Moskalyov's parental rights. The lawsuit was filed in January, even before Moskalyov's arrest. The head of the commission, Svetlana Davydova, told the media that since May 2022, the Moskalyov family has been on a preventive register of families in socially dangerous situations: “The parents did not cooperate with the authorities, the father was twice brought to administrative responsibility and made no attempts to return his daughter to school, and Maria's mother lived separately and was not interested in her life,” In connection with this, on March 3, the commission on juvenile affairs decided to keep Maria in the center," but soon after, the court decided to transfer Masha to her mother. On March 28, 2023, the Yefremovsky Interdistrict Court of the Tula Region found Alexei Moskalyov guilty and sentenced him to two years in a general regime colony. Moskalev did not appear at the sentencing hearing—he escaped from house arrest: the Federal Penitentiary Service of the Tula Region stated that Alexei Moskalev left his home at 4:41 a.m. on March 28. Two days later, on March 30, Alexei Moskalyov was detained in an apartment in Minsk and placed in a pre-trial detention center in Zhodino. On April 13, Belarus handed Moskalyov over to Russia. He was first transferred to a pre-trial detention center in the Smolensk region, and then to a pre-trial detention center in Tula. On February 19, 2024, the Tula Regional Court ruled to overturn the first sentence and impose a new sentence: 1 year and 10 months, taking into account the time already served. The court also added a two-year ban on administering websites.