Urbanist and Chelyabinsk City Duma candidate Mikhail Popov said he suffered a spinal fracture after jumping from the second floor. According to him, he was trying to get away from police officers who had come to his home.
Popov reported the police visit on July 13. He said two officers came: a district police officer who had questioned him earlier after an attack in September 2025, and another officer.
Several hours later, Popov published a photograph from a hospital. In the image, he is lying under an IV drip and wearing a medical neck brace. After that, the report says, he stopped responding to journalists who were trying to find out what had happened.
A source close to Popov told 7×7 that he decided to get out of the apartment because he feared the door might be broken down. According to the source, it is still unknown why the police came to see him.
The same source said the district officer later came to the hospital and asked Popov why he had jumped out of the window. At the same time, according to the journalists’ interlocutor, the officer denied having been at Popov’s home at all.
According to 7×7, two more men dressed in black arrived with the police. They were carrying a stretcher and possibly gas masks. It is unclear who they were or why those items were needed. The report says they were captured by the building’s intercom camera.
Mikhail Popov is known for writing a blog about public transport and urban improvement. Since early July, he has been collecting signatures to run for the Chelyabinsk city council as an independent candidate. The election in Chelyabinsk is scheduled for September 20, the single voting day on which Russia will also elect State Duma deputies.