An administrative case was opened against Dmitry Mishin, the leader of the Movement for New Socialism’s supporters in Mari El, for the picket of snowmen in front of the Ministry of Interior of Mari El on January 24. He reported this on his page on vk.com on February 2.
The administrative case against the activist was initiated under Part 2 of Article 20.2 of the Administrative Code (Violation of the Established Procedure for Holding a Picket) on January 26. The notice of initiation states that Mishin has displayed “visual propaganda.”
The supporters of Nikolai Platoshkin (the leader of the Movement for New Socialism) built several snowmen in front of the Ministry of Interior of Mari El in the morning of January 24. The snowmen were placed there with the posters saying, "Peskov said, „There is no palace“ — we do believe him!", "Stop the crazy printer that grinds out anti-popular laws! The State Duma should resign! Those totally approving should be brought to justice!", "Freedom to Nikolai Platoshkin!", "Selling a cleaning cart high, will share it with right people", "And now try to fine us for holding a rally!".
On January 25, municipal deputy from Yoshkar-Ola Anton Sokolov, whose Telegram channel "Man Among Deputies" published a photo of snowmen, and Dmitry Mishin were subpoenaed to the department for combating extremism of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Mari El and demanded to give explanations about having built the snowmen. They were suspected of "building a vertical structure on which a poster was pulled."
As part of the case, the police intend to conduct a linguistic examination. Dmitry Mishin faces a fine of 10 to 20 thousand rubles or community service for up to 40 hours.
On January 24, residents of Kostroma built several snowmen near a fence, surrounding the construction site of a nine-storied building, and attached posters, demanding to stop the site development of the grove, to them.
Three days later, in Arkhangelsk Oblast, police detained Elena Kalinina, an activist of the Pomorye is not a Dump! Movement, because she had built several snowmen with posters "Down with the tsar", "This is our country", and "Vova, it is all over between us" near her house in the village of Zachachye. However, police officers could not choose a possible article of the Administrative Code of the Russian Federation to charge the activist with and released her from the department.