The Kaliningrad Regional Court has concluded the criminal case against Kaliningrad lawyer Mariya Bontsler. Judge Aleksandr Marochkin sentenced her to 12 years in prison on charges of high treason; the prosecution had requested 15 years. The trial was held behind closed doors, with the final hearings taking place without the presence of defense attorneys or the defendant herself, and only the verdict was announced publicly.
Defendant's statements and defense position
Speaking after the sentencing, Bontsler stated that "convicting an innocent person is a terrible crime" and added that she would "pray for her executioners, that the Lord might be merciful to them." Her legal colleagues consider the case to be politically motivated. A lawyer who requested anonymity for safety reasons stated that such cases are "fabricated" by the FSB and that the prosecution of Bontsler is revenge for her professional activities, comparing her status to that of Aleksey Sokolov, co-founder of the "Human Rights Defenders of the Urals" organization.
Who is Mariya Bontsler
Bontsler is one of the few lawyers in Kaliningrad who defended those accused under political articles, including the seriously ill Igor Baryshnikov, who was convicted in the "army fakes" case. She collaborated with OVD-Info, Memorial, and Open Russia before these organizations were shut down, and she is the only laureate in the region of the Moscow Helsinki Group Award for human rights protection. In February and March 2022, following the start of the war in Ukraine and anti-war rallies in Kaliningrad, she had 35 clients at once; thirty of them were accused of "discrediting the armed forces," and five others were arrested for participating in unsanctioned protests. Bontsler herself was fined 30,000 rubles twice for "discrediting the army" because she used the word "war" twice during a court hearing.
How the case developed
According to the prosecution, the motive for the persecution was found in Telegram correspondence with a person the investigation identified as an SBU officer named Dyachuk. Initially, Bontsler was accused of passing data on Russian security officials and information on criminal cases handled by the FSB to foreign intelligence services (Art. 275.1 of the Criminal Code). As the case materials show, in 2024, the mother of Kaliningrad resident Ivan Kveselevich, who was in a pre-trial detention center on charges of confidential cooperation with Ukrainian intelligence services, reached out to her and said she wanted to hire a lawyer for her son's defense. In late May 2025, raids were conducted at the homes of Bontsler and other Kaliningrad lawyers, Ekaterina Selizarova and Roman Morozov, after which she was detained and placed in a pre-trial detention center.
Conditions of detention
In the pre-trial detention center, Bontsler complained, according to her own words, about the lack of medical care; she suffers from diabetes and hypertension. The lawyer commenting on the case claims she is being denied treatment, the assignment of disability status, as well as a proper diet, and describes the sentence as a "death sentence," noting that the case is under the supervision of the UN Human Rights Committee.
