How and for What Russians Are Judged in 2024
The Judicial Department at the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation has published new data on the number and composition of convicted individuals. The IStories data team explains what has become known from this data
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The number of people convicted of state treason has broken the record (again)
In 2024, 145 people were convicted under the article on state treason — four times more than in the previous year. Such a high figure has never been seen in modern Russia. 23 people were convicted of espionage — this is 2.5 times more than in 2023.
21 people received sentences for confidential cooperation with a foreign state. This is 10 times more than in the previous year. This article was introduced into the Criminal Code after the start of the war with Ukraine.
The actual number of those convicted of state treason and espionage could be several times higher, noted the human rights project Department One, which compared the official statistics of the Judicial Department with the number of verdict records published on court websites.
The number of those convicted under articles related to state secrets also continues to grow. In 2024, 209 people received such sentences — one-third more than a year earlier. The main growth is associated with the article on violation of requirements for the protection of state secrets, which appeared after the start of the war in Ukraine. Sentences under this article are handed down, for example, for traveling abroad despite restrictions on departure due to access to state secrets.
What military personnel are being tried for
In 2024, the number of military personnel convicted under criminal articles almost doubled (more than 13.7 thousand people). 80% of the increase was provided by sentences for crimes related to military service (desertion, failure to comply with orders, and others). Over the year, the number of those convicted under these articles increased by almost five thousand — from 4.4 thousand to 9.2 thousand.
After military crimes, the largest increase was shown by drug-related articles — the number of military personnel convicted of these crimes increased by 78% and reached 679 people, which is one in every twenty convicted military personnel.
67% more military personnel (more than a thousand people) received sentences for traffic violations and drunk driving. The number of military personnel convicted of grievous bodily harm increased by 40% — from 133 to 187 people.
134 military personnel were convicted of murder. This is 18 people more than in 2023. The number of military personnel convicted under the first part of the article reached 70 people. 64 were convicted under the second part of the article — for the murder of two or more persons, minors or pregnant women. In 2023, 116 conscripts and contract soldiers were convicted of murder under both parts of the article, and 13 in 2022.
Record number of claims for recognition of persons as deceased or missing
In 2024, Russian courts received more than 17.4 thousand civil claims to recognize people as dead or missing, according to statistics from the Judicial Department at the Supreme Court. This is almost three times more than in 2023, and a record value since at least 2010.
The number of satisfied claims also increased: 10 thousand out of 11 thousand considered by the courts. In 2023, there were 2.5 times fewer: the courts satisfied 4.1 thousand such claims out of 4.9 thousand considered.
Earlier, IStories told how, with the help of this procedure, the families of Russian servicemen “bury” their men in courts: their bodies were never recovered from the battlefield, or nothing remained of them. Families declare even missing men dead — some for financial compensation, others out of sheer despair.
An analysis of published texts of court decisions on such claims, conducted by IStories in 2024, shows that relatives are still more likely to be asked to recognize Russian military personnel as deceased rather than missing. And recognition as “missing” for the families of participants in the war may be just a formality: according to the law, if within three months after the recognition of a serviceman as “missing” there is no news about him, relatives can file a lawsuit to recognize him as deceased.
Draft dodgers do not face real prison time, but the average fine for this has increased
In 2024, 916 Russians received sentences for evading military conscription. Two more were convicted on charges of evading alternative civilian service.
In most cases, the courts imposed fines of up to 100 thousand rubles — 95% of all those convicted. At the same time, the average fine is increasing, as draft dodgers are increasingly being fined amounts of 25 thousand rubles or more.
Only five Russians received suspended sentences. Actual imprisonment was applied as a punishment under this article only once — in 2022, according to data from the Judicial Department.
The maximum punishment under the article provides for imprisonment for up to two years. As the human rights project Get Lost notes, grounds for initiating a criminal case arise only after the conscript has been brought to administrative responsibility. According to the Ministry of Defense, in 2023, courts issued more than 47 thousand rulings under this article of the Code of Administrative Offenses, more than half of them being fines of 1–5 thousand rubles for failure to report a change of address.
Get Lost also described the situations in which the criminal article on evasion of conscription is usually applied. There are three such situations: if the conscript did not arrive for deployment to the army; for several conscription periods ignored summonses for medical examination or meetings of the draft board; received exemption from service through fraud.
Authorities continue to deport migrants from the country at a record pace
The intensification of anti-migrant rhetoric in Russia could not but be reflected in the statistics of the Judicial Department. In 2024, courts received more than 244 thousand cases of violation of immigration legislation against foreigners — a new record.
174 thousand people received administrative expulsion orders. At the same time, according to the authorities, about 87 thousand people were actually deported from the country — twice as many as in 2023. In most cases, they were deported to the countries of the former USSR: Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Moldova, Kyrgyzstan, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, and Belarus.
The total amount of fines imposed on migrants has almost doubled and also broke the record — in 2024, foreigners were fined 1.2 billion rubles for violating migration legislation.
Editor: Katya Bonch-Osmolovskaya