A message was published on the Vesti website under the heading “A resident of Odessa was sentenced to 15 years in prison for the Russian flag.” The court allegedly handed down such a sentence for the fact that an Odessa citizen hung out the Russian tricolor from the window of a residential building.
The Odessa citizen, whose name was not disclosed, was indeed sentenced to 15 years in prison. And he really hung a Russian flag and a poster with the inscription “Odessa is a Russian city” out of the window of an apartment building. But he did not get 15 years for this action – more precisely, not only for it. The official Telegram channel of the State Bureau of Investigation of Ukraine reports :
“?Special operation of the State Bureau of Investigation and the SBU: the court convicted and imprisoned for 15 years a resident of Odessa, who collaborated with the FSB of the Russian Federation and tried to kidnap a person.
? A man after a full-scale invasion of the invaders began to conduct subversive activities in Odessa. In particular, on August 22, 2022, he placed the flag of the Russian Federation with the caption: “Odessa is a Russian city” on one of the residential buildings in Odessa. He handed over the photo with the flag to representatives of the aggressor state for use in propaganda materials.
?Also, the man collected and passed to the invaders information about the Armed Forces of Ukraine and military facilities in Odessa, data about Ukrainian patriots, recruited former Ukrainian law enforcement officers for subversive activities against Ukraine.
The traitor did not refuse from ordinary criminal activity. He and his accomplices planned to kidnap a patriotic entrepreneur from Odessa, who was engaged in volunteer activities. To do this, the attackers set up a basement for torturing the man so that he “agreed” to give up all his property and money. They told the curators from the FSB that they wanted to do this in order to destabilize the situation in the city, and also in order to exchange the Ukrainian patriot for Russian prisoners after the capture of Odessa by the aggressor troops.
?At the end of September, the State Bureau of Investigation together with the SBU conducted a special operation to detain a man with his accomplices.
?A resident of Odessa was found guilty of high treason, collaboration activities and kidnapping (part 2 of article 111, part 6 of article 111-1, part 3 of article 146 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine).
The court sentenced him to 15 years in prison."
It should be noted that the Ukrainian court treated the traitor quite gently. Paragraph 2 of Article 111 (“High treason”) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine establishes for this crime committed under martial law, imprisonment for a term of 15 years to life. Thus, for cooperation with the FSB, expressed in the collection of information about the Armed Forces of Ukraine and attempts to recruit agents, he received the minimum term prescribed by law, and the punishment for collaboration activities and an attempted kidnapping was actually absorbed by this term.
“Vesti” in its message stipulates that the convict “in addition, was accused of transferring data on the movement of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and preparing for a kidnapping,” but it is worded in such a way as to create the impression that the sentence was passed precisely for the hung Russian flag.