The Constitutional Court will move on 1 April (it’s not a joke for the All Fools Day!) from Moscow to St Petersburg. It is likely that by the end of April it will have made its decision on one of the most ridiculous criminal prosecutions, that’s the Manana Aslamazyan’s case. 

Reminding, on 21 January 2007 Manana Aslamazyan, the founder and the head of the non-commercial organization Internews (that’s “Educated Media” Fund) arrived to Moscow from Paris and wanted to pass the customs control through the “green corridor” of the Sheremetevo Airport. Being asked if she had any foreign currency on her, she honestly declared to have 9.5 thousand of Euros. Immediately, a protocol was drawn up saying about administrative infraction, not about criminal case. However, nine days after the item was made about the incident by NTV station saying about the “smuggler” Aslamazyan. The accent in the item was made on receiving by Internews the grants from western sponsors and three months after the searches and confiscations were made in the Educated Media Fund. A bit later the Fund had to declare itself to be self-dissolved and Manana had to leave for Paris where she found a job.     

Hundreds of journalists, deputies, and Public Chamber members stood bond for Manana Aslamazyan. President Putin also promised to see to that ridiculous story with obvious political implication. However, he never had the final on that case. 

Now it’s the Constitutional Court’s turn. It is known that this court does not consider the criminal cases. But according to Aslamazyan’s defense, the Article #188 of the Criminal Code has a defect of “legal uncertainty” if we look on it from the point of view of the Constitution. The matter is that the law on foreign currency control establishes the limit of $10,000 that can be passed through the Russian border without declaration made. Manana says she just failed to take into consideration the difference of the exchange rate between Euro and US dollar. In the meantime, Clause 1 of the Article 188 is formulated in terms of grand violation of exchange control. The defense and prosecution disagree about the arithmetic terms. Investigation – not taking into consideration that Manana just could have placed the money on the plastic card - says the rule of “grand violation” should be applied to the whole amount, while the defense says it must be applied only to an excessive part surpassing the allowed limit. In such a calculation, the unlawful cap would be only 250 thousand rubles which entails administrative, and not criminal, liability.      

No one is able to say today which way of calculation is right. The Constitutional court cannot do it either. But it can accept or reject the arguments by the lawyers Viktor Parshutkin and Boris Kuznetsov saying that the situation contradicts the principle of legal certainty and a citizen cannot understand clearly if he/she acts lawfully or unlawfully. In case of positive decision by the Constitutional court the criminal case against Manana Aslamazyan will be closed, like other similar cases.