Blogger Lercek asked Putin to pardon

Lawyer Konstantin Tretyakov told RIA Novosti that blogger Lerchek, whose real name is Valeria Chekalina, appealed to Russian President Vladimir Putin with a request for pardon.

Earlier, the court appointed her five years probation and a fine of 763.5 million rubles in the case of withdrawal of more than 250 million rubles in the UAE to the accounts of non-residents on forged documents.

In February, Chekalina was diagnosed with stage four stomach cancer. In the fall, the disease began to progress, she began a second course of chemotherapy, and doctors recommended considering the possibility of CAR-T-cell therapy in China.

The defense appealed to the court and the FSIN with a request to allow the blogger to leave for treatment in China. According to the lawyer, Valeria wrote an appeal for pardon addressed to the President of Russia. He explained that by law, the convict sends such applications through the administration of the colony or the pre-trial detention center, where he is serving his sentence, but since Chekalina was sentenced to a suspended sentence, the application was submitted through the president’s online reception and sent to the Federal Penitentiary Service.

Earlier it was reported that the former Russian Minister was involved in more than 300 criminal cases.