Roman Baliasin

He is a trade representative. He told the “Taiga.info” news outlet that at night he had tried to paint over the Latin letter “Z” written in place of the Cyrillic letter “З” [“Z”] in the inscription “Zheleznogorsk” in a park near the forest area. An unknown person approached him from behind, Baliasin brushed him off and the former fell down. It turned out that it was a group of law enforcement officers in plain clothes, but with batons and service weapons. Baliasin was handcuffed, beaten, insulted and threatened to be raped with a stick. The man Baliasin brushed off was found to have an abrasion on his face. After that Baliasin was taken to a police department and interrogated. On 2 August, the Investigative Committee initiated a criminal case. Baliasin claims that he could only hit the right side of the law enforcement officer’s face, and the latter was left with a bruise and a cut above his left eye. Baliasin is under personal recognizance. He was also charged with an administrative offence of discrediting the Russian army (Part 1 of Article 20.3.3 of the Code of Administrative Offences) for making “marks with spray paint” on a “poster with the Latin letter ‘Z’”.