Moscow Police Detain Child Reciting Poetry

Takie Dela

May 26, 2017

Police detained a child reading poetry aloud on Moscow’s Vozdvizhenka Street. Takie Dela was informed about the incident by the website OVD Info‘s person on duty.

The child, reportedly ten years old, and his mother were relaxing near Arbatskaya subway station. The mother was sitting on a bench and reading, while the boy recited poetry a little ways away from her. A police patrol stopped near the boy, and police officers forced the boy into their car. They refused to let the mother talk to her son, explaining he would be charged with begging. In addition, the police pushed the woman, causing her to drop and smash her tablet computer.

The boy was taken to Arbat Police Precinct. He was transported there without his parents. Later, his mother was brought to the same precinct. The child’s father arrived at Arbat Police Precinct later.

According to unconfirmed reports, the father could be charged with the administrative offense of insulting a police officer. He refused to sign a charge sheet accusing the parents of not fulfilling their parental duties, since he did not agree with the charges. The child is currently at the police precinct. As of this writing, Arbat Police Precinct is refusing to answer their telephone.

An eyewitness has posted a video showing the child screaming inside the police car.

Update, 10:10 p.m. The boy’s father, Ilya Skavronski, has told Mediazona that the boy goes to a theater workshop and was reciting Hamlet. The police officers in question conversed with the boy for a time at a distance of twenty to twenty-give meters from his mother, who approached them only when the boy had been forced into their car. According to Skavronski, the policemen cursed and behaved rudely while detaining his son. He added that the precinct’s deputy head had threatened to detain the boy’s mother on charges of resisting law enforcement officers.

Update, 12:00 a.m. The Moscow Police’s Information Response Department explained that the boy had been detained because he was alone and had been going up to “one car after another.” According to OVD Info, he has been released from the police precinct. Skavronski has been charged with violating Article 5.35 of the Administrative Offenses Code (non-fulfillment by parents of their child-raising duties of minors). Earlier, attorneys had arrived at the precinct, as well as Anatoly Kucherena, chair of the Interior Ministry’s Public Council. The lawyers are filing complaints against the actions of the police.

Translated by the Russian Reader. Image courtesy of Mediazona