A Family Member Has Been Arrested or Convicted in Russia: What Relatives Abroad Should Know
Discovering that a close friend or family member has been taken into custody, charged with a crime, or convicted in Russia can leave a family uncertain about what to do next - especially when you are living thousands of kilometres from Russia, do not speak Russian, and receive only fragments of information. Russia's criminal procedure can be difficult to navigate even for Russian citizens; for families outside Russia, the language barrier, physical distance, and unfamiliar procedures create additional practical difficulties.
This guide, prepared by the criminal defence team of Yalanzhi & Partners in Moscow, describes what normally happens at every major stage of a Russian criminal case, what time limits families need to know, which mistakes can seriously damage the defence, and what steps can still be taken in practice - even after a conviction has been entered.
First step: establish the facts before discussing strategy
Before any strategy is possible, the family needs precise answers: where exactly the person is detained, which authority is investigating, what criminal offence the person is suspected or accused of committing, whether the person has been formally charged, whether the court has imposed detention as a preventive measure, and whether a lawyer - state-appointed or privately retained - is already involved. For foreign nationals, there are additional issues to clarify around translation and interpretation, consular assistance, and contact with relatives. The sooner an independent defence lawyer reviews the situation, the more opportunities there generally are to influence the course of the case. Work done at the investigation stage - objections raised, evidence challenged, mitigating circumstances placed on the record - may determine what arguments remain available on appeal. This is what defence during the investigation is intended to achieve: protecting the person now while building the record for the future.
Charges foreign nationals face most often
In cases handled by our team, foreign citizens in Russia are most frequently prosecuted under a recognisable set of provisions of the Russian Criminal Code. These frequently involve Article 228 and Article 228.1 (drug possession and trafficking), Article 229.1 (smuggling of narcotic substances, including cases arising at airports), Article 159 (fraud-related offences), Articles 111 and 112 (intentional infliction of bodily injury), Articles 131 and 132 (offences of a sexual nature), Article 105 (murder), and Article 322 (unlawful crossing of the state border). Every category presents different questions of evidence and its own body of judicial practice, which can significantly affect the legal strategy. Further information about our approach to such cases: defence against criminal charges.
Why the trial record is critical for a future appeal
The statistical rate of acquittal at first instance in Russia is extremely low. Families should understand this not as a reason for despair but as a reason to plan realistically: in the Russian system, much of the real contest happens on review, before appellate and cassation courts. And those courts rely heavily on the written case record. If mitigating circumstances were never documented, if the admissibility of key evidence was never challenged, if arguments concerning the correct legal classification were not placed on the record - it can become significantly more difficult to rely on those arguments later. A well-prepared first-instance defence therefore serves two purposes simultaneously: defending the case before the trial court while preserving grounds for subsequent review.
After conviction: deadlines and available stages of review
A court's guilty verdict is not necessarily the final opportunity to challenge the case. Russian law establishes a series of procedures through which a conviction may be reviewed. An appellate appeal must be filed within 15 days of the judgment under Article 389.4 of the Code of Criminal Procedure; for someone being held in custody, the period is calculated from the date on which the judgment is formally delivered to them. Importantly, on an appeal brought solely by the defence, the court cannot impose a less favourable outcome merely because the defence appealed - Russian procedural law contains protection against such deterioration - so the family risks nothing by appealing. Once the judgment has taken legal effect, a cassation appeal is available: the first, mandatory cassation review must be requested within 6 months, while subsequent review proceedings - including a petition to the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation - may remain available without a rigid filing deadline where the requested outcome would benefit the convicted person. Russian criminal judgments can be modified or overturned even years after becoming final when the defence finds substantial legal grounds capable of affecting the judgment. A procedural deadline that has already expired, if missed for a legally recognised reason, can also be restored by the court.
How we evaluate a case before asking for payment
Our approach to challenging convictions follows the same initial principle: by examining the documents rather than making promises. We ask the family to send the written judgment and, if appeal or cassation proceedings have already occurred, the subsequent appeal and cassation rulings - the documents can be sent as scans or readable photographs. The text is digitised and matched with our internal database of 136,000 Russian criminal cases in which judgments were changed, sentences reduced, or convictions overturned, indexed by article of charge, case circumstances, nature of the violation, region, and court instance.
Our lawyers then study the comparable decisions and decide whether the available judicial practice provides a realistic basis for further review. This initial case assessment is free of charge, and in the majority of cases - roughly eight out of ten our professional conclusion is that the available grounds are not sufficiently strong - the judgment is legally sound on the issues reviewed, or the available court practice is contradictory. Families abroad are especially vulnerable to people selling hope; we would rather decline a case than sell false hope. When there are genuine legal grounds for a challenge, the client is told before retaining us which relevant court rulings form the basis of the proposed defence strategy.
Serving a prison sentence: parole and a milder punishment
For those already serving a custodial sentence, the law provides two important routes that may become available: conditional early release (parole, Article 79 of the Criminal Code) and commutation of the unserved part of the sentence to a less severe form of punishment under Article 80, including, where legally applicable, a less restrictive correctional arrangement. The point at which a person becomes eligible depends on the seriousness and legal category of the offence together with the proportion of the sentence completed; preparation - conduct records, employment, restitution, family circumstances - matters enormously and should start early. Further guidance on these options can be found here: parole and sentence commutation.
How we work with families abroad without requiring them to travel
Our practice is designed to work effectively with clients and families overseas: documents are transferred in digital form, and representation before regional appellate and cassation courts can be coordinated using court videoconferencing - a recognised and routinely used legal procedure. When a case is brought before the Supreme Court of Russia, our lawyers attend in person: the Court is located in Moscow, where our office is located. Where physical representation before a regional court is necessary or preferred, we work with verified local counsel while our team remains responsible for the legal strategy and drafting.
Equally importantly, you will be able to understand what is happening in the case. We communicate with families in a language they understand, and our reports to families are designed to be understandable rather than filled with procedural terminology: what was filed, what the court has ruled, what happens next and when. A word-for-word translation of legal jargon is not meaningful communication; explaining the situation clearly is. For relatives following a case from another country, that ability to understand the process is almost as important as receiving the documents themselves.
A note of caution
Be extremely careful with anyone who guarantees a result, claims to have "connections", or demands immediate payment while discouraging you from speaking to anyone else. No lawyer can lawfully promise a particular decision from an independent court, and paying for "influence" can expose your own family to criminal risk. A reputable criminal defence lawyer sells analysis, strategy, and documented work - and should have no difficulty explaining the legal grounds they see and identifying the person who will actually handle the case.
Start with the documents
If a family member has been arrested or accused of a criminal offence in Russia, or has already been convicted, do not wait until you have collected the entire case file. Send the documents you have been able to obtain - even the judgment by itself can provide substantial information - for a preliminary confidential assessment without charge at
lawyersinrussia.com. Sometimes there are significant grounds for further proceedings; in other cases, an honest assessment shows that few viable options remain. Either way, what your family needs first is not a promise. It is an informed assessment of the current situation.
Author: Grigoriy Nosov, Head of Criminal Practice, Yalanzhi & Partners - Head of Criminal Practice
