On the evening of August 30, musician and blogger Anna Leonenko (Lady Leo) performed in the center of Moscow on Nikolskaya Street. During the performance, the singer was streaming on YouTube. Approximately 2.5 hours into the concert, the sound of a police car was heard in the background, and the singer asked, “Is this for me?” Later, the police officers approached Anna and demanded that she accompany them to the police station, as reported by ASTRA readers.
According to the explanation provided by the Ministry of Internal Affairs during the stream, all street musicians are required to submit applications on the Moscow Mayor’s website before performing, and Leonenko allegedly failed to do so. The police were called by a local resident who complained about the “disturbance of silence.”
When the girl said that she was afraid to get into a police car alone and would only go with a “confidant,” the police officer replied that she would go alone, and “if you do not comply with my legal demands, I will use physical force against you.” One of the police officers introduced himself as Albert Nailievich Shaidulin, according to ASTRA. Before putting the blogger in the car, the police officers forced her to end her stream. She was taken to the Kitai-Gorod police station. A few hours later, Anna posted a video on her Telegram channel, in which she said that she had been released from the police station, but that all of her musical equipment had been confiscated, except for her guitar (which she managed to “defend,” as one of Leonenko’s musicians noted in the comments).
“It’s a complete mess, they took all of my equipment, and they kept me there for a long time. My nerves are [unintelligible],” the girl said.
Anna also noted that while she was waiting for her friends to come and pick her up from the police station, an unknown person hit her on the head. They drew up a protocol against her, but she didn’t tell anything.
As ASTRA reported, on August 28, the police in St. Petersburg detained musicians who were playing songs of foreign agents on the streets due to a violation of silence.
