- Joined
- Sep 10, 2009
You have no idea how bored I got to read the stuff like that on some Russian forums. In fact it works quite simple. For example, I say: "I doubt you are a decent person, I think you are on drugs, in my opinion you run a meth lab and you steal money from your boss. I also doubt you are not a sex pervert. In my opinion you are just one chronic liar." Etc. You know what ALL people start yelling the same instant? Something like "How dare you INSULT me?" or somesuch. The point is: the statements like yours is just hypocritical demagogy. Because the moment it hits YOU, you all behave the same way. Yawn.
No, you should refer to slander. There is no "sue", no "plaintiff" and no "libel" in this case. Plu filed criminal charges against the commentator, not civil ones. The R-law has the civil legislation for Protection of the Honour, Dignity and Busness Reputation (art. 152 Civil Code), as well as criminal legisation for Slander (art. 128.1 Criminal Code). The civil legislation is mainly applied against legal entities like mass media for example, almost never against individuals. But exception happens, like that story that took place with another sport commnetator Guberniev sometime ago. He was commenting the football match on Rossiya-2 which was also broadcasted online on sportbox.ru. When it was a commercial break on Rossiya-2 but on on sportbox.ru, he said about the goalkeeper that he is a 'sh-word' in gates and told unpleasnt stuff about the guy's wife's death (was killed in a car accident). He was sued by the athlete under art. 152 of Civil Code and lost, had to pay 75k Rub to the footballer as moral damage. The article for Slander in the Criminal Code was always there, except a brief break between Dec 2011 and July 2012, can be applied only against individuals and sets the responsibility for the spreading deliberately falsified information that denigrates the honour and dignity of another person or undermines his reputation. The art. 128.1 2). refers to the situation when such information was contained in public speech or mass media. It's a public prosecution jurisdiction, punishable by a fine up to 1mil Rub (over $33k) or compulsory works up to 240 hours. There are other consequences too- like criminal records (it's a felony afterall), no possibility to get a passport for oveaseas travels until this criminal record got wiped out (after one year for this crime), etc. Naturally the criminal article is way stricter than the civil one, because the worse thing was committed- deliberate lie to damage someone and spoken in public. The article is in apply when the fact of spreading of deliberately falsified information takes place. Other consequences like lost of material profits from future venues are irrelevant. Non-material values (like dignity, honour, good name) are values by themselves and therefore protected by law, the person can demand the compensation of moral damage if he wishes. If the material damage also took place by the crime of slander, then it's a separate demand that is treated like any other material lost.
. Because nobody has ever sued anyone for libel in any country outside Russia? How do you even know what Plushenko will or won't need to do? Are you an expert on Russian legal procedure in such cases? How do you know that Russian society is too litigious? Is that an area of expertise for you?
