Mother of 7 acquitted of treason gets official apology

Svetlana Davydova, a mother of seven who was suspected of high treason and subsequently acquitted, received an official letter of apology from the General Prosecutor’s Office. According to her lawyer Ivan Pavlov, the letter was from the assistant General Prosecutor.

“Today, Svetlana Davydova received an official letter from the assistant General Prosecutor A. K. Nikitina. The letter contains an official apology in the name of the state for the harm inflicted by the criminal proceedings for high treasons, which ended on March 13,” said Davydova’s lawyer.

Police arrested Svetlana Davydova, a mother of seven living in Smolensk, on suspicion of treason in late March. She was suspected of reporting to the Ukrainian embassy a conversation she had heard on a bus in which possible deployment of Russian troops in eastern Ukraine was discussed. She has been acquitted of the crime.

Andrei Stebenev, the defense attorney assigned to Davydova at the beginning of the criminal proceedings, said that the charges against her were substantiated. He also missed the deadline for appealing her arrest. Davydova eventually declined the services of Stebenev, and he has since been disbarred by the Bar Association of Moscow.