Maria Bontsler

Founder and former head of the Committee of Soldiers' Mothers of the Kaliningrad region. Since 2007, she has been practising as a lawyer. She defended participants of protest rallies, including anti-war ones. She defended Igor Baryshnikov, who was convicted in a criminal case of "fakes" about the Russian Armed Forces for his social media posts about the war in Ukraine.

On 28 May 2025, her home was searched, after which Bontsler was detained in a case of confidential cooperation with a foreign state, international or foreign organisation.

On the same day, law enforcers visited two other Kaliningrad lawyers, Roman Morozov and Ekaterina Selizarova, who also defended Baryshnikov.

The IC claims that in 2024, Bontsler passed to the special services of an "unfriendly state" information about law enforcement officers in the Kaliningrad region, which she collected during her work as a lawyer. The agency also claims that other lawyers visited by law enforcers were "aware of the criminal activities of the defendant".

On 29 May 2025, Bontsler was taken into custody.

During the court hearing to appeal the initiation of the case, Bontsler stated that the FSB officer Kirill Takhtov, who used violence against her and who, according to her, had previously repeatedly used violence against persons under investigation, was interested in her arrest and imprisonment.

On 25 September 2025, the Kaliningrad Oblast Bar Association suspended Bontsler's lawyer status.