Aleksei Bykov

A resident of St Petersburg. In February 2025, law enforcement officers conducted a search of his home in connection with a criminal case on the justification of terrorism, related to six comments posted in the chat “Russia Will Be Free”, in which he expressed support for the RDK and called on others to join the unit. According to those close to him, during the search, security officers severely beat Bykov and threatened that they would “hand him over” to participants in the war.

Bykov himself stated that he gave self-incriminating testimony under pressure from the security services.

Bykov believes that the criminal case against him was initiated following a denunciation by the administrators of the Telegram chat “Vostok-Zapad”, with whom he had a conflict arising from discussions about the war in Ukraine. According to Bykov, they threatened him with criminal prosecution and said that they had already filed a report, although at the time he did not attach any significance to this. He also stated that after the conflict, an unknown user wrote to him in private messages and offered that he photograph and send images of buildings and vehicles, assuring him that nothing would happen to him for doing so. Bykov refused.

On 31 October 2025, the court sentenced him to five and a half years’ imprisonment in a general-regime penal colony.