Richard Rose, a political prisoner from Kirov, has become a defendant in a new criminal case. According to an excerpt from his letter published by his support group, he is now charged under articles on justifying terrorism and rehabilitating Nazism. Rose says the case is based on claims that he had allegedly “justified ISIS and Vlasovites,” which he denies.
“They accuse me of justifying ISIS and Vlasovites. It’s absurd, I can’t stand ISIS. And the part about the Vlasovites is simply far-fetched. I myself do not know in detail whom or how exactly I supposedly justified there. They fabricated a fake, and I became guilty,” his letter says.
The new case became known on June 6, 2026, when his wife, Maria Rose, told the outlet 7x7 that her husband was being accused under Article 205.2 of the Russian Criminal Code, which covers justification of or calls for terrorism. It later emerged that investigators had also added a charge under Part 1 of Article 354.1 on rehabilitating Nazism. Maria Rose believes the new prosecution may be connected to her husband’s conversations with cellmates and the contents of his letters.
Earlier, in September 2023, the Central District Military Court in Yekaterinburg sentenced Rose to eight years in a penal colony in a case over military “fakes” and justification of terrorism. The prosecution was based on his social media posts: first, a repost on VKontakte of a video about the killings of civilians in Bucha, and later a comment under a video appeal by musician Sviatoslav Vakarchuk in which Rose wrote that the only way to stop Vladimir Putin was to kill him physically.
FSB officers detained the Rose couple on April 14, 2022. Richard was sent to pretrial detention, while Maria was placed under restrictions. She was later charged in cases involving military “fakes” and calls for extremism. Rose said officers beat him in the face, back, and legs during the detention, but, according to him, his complaint was not added to the case file. In December 2022, both were added to the list of terrorists and extremists. Maria left Russia, and in January 2024 a court in Kirov sentenced her in absentia to five and a half years in a general-regime penal colony.
Richard Rose is a native of Kirov, a photographer, and a civic activist who took part in campaigns supporting political prisoners, in Navalny’s Kirov штаb activities, and in the protest march “He Is Not Our Tsar” in May 2018. In recent years, the article says, he had devoted more time to his family and his photography work.