Antonina Kravtsova (Favorskaia)
Antonina Kravtsova (Favorskaia), born 1989, Moscow. Charges: Article 282.1 part 2, Russian Criminal Code (Participation in an extremist community); “The case of journalists' participation in activities of an extremist community”. Sentence (April 15, 2025): 5 years 6 months' imprisonment in a general regime penal colony. Status: imprisoned; deprived of liberty since March 27, 2024; place of detention: Penal colony No. 3, Kostroma Oblast. Recognition: Memorial: Support for Political Prisoners — recognised as a political prisoner, May 13, 2024.
In brief
Moscow · Moscow · Journalists · Extremism cases, Cases against Navalny/ACF supporters
Sentence
5 years 6 months
imprisonment in a general regime penal colony
Upheld December 4, 2025
Charges
- Article 282.1 part 2, Russian Criminal Code — Participation in an extremist community
Full wording of the charges
According to the investigation, "during the period from November 2022 to March 2024", "in accordance with the assigned role in the extremist community, carried out her criminal activities by shooting videos and photos with their subsequent posting by unidentified persons on the Internet, including on the YouTube channel "Navalny LIVE, on the channel "Navalny's Team" in the social network Telegram". In addition, "in the period from 24 November 2022 to 18 January 2024", "acting deliberately, on the instructions of the head of the extremist community" Ivan Zhdanov "and unidentified leaders and participants of the extremist community, with the aim of discrediting the current government, while using for conspiracy purposes his work in the online publication "Sota.Vision" where Artem Kriger who later joined the extremist community also worked hiding behind editorial assignments filmed and audio-recorded the speeches of the extremist community leader Alexei Navalny, as well as the pronouncements of court decisions on Alexei Navalny's administrative claims in court proceedings held during working hours from 09.00 to 18.00. 00 a.m. to 6 p.m. 00 min. in the Kovrov City Court of the Vladimir Region", "including on the following dates: 24 November 2022, 11 and 25 January 2023, 27 February 2023, 13 and 17 November 2023, 15 and 18 January 2024". After the filming was completed, "acting deliberately, on the instructions of the leader of the extremist community, Zhdanov, and unidentified leaders and participants of the extremist community, while in the town of Kovrov in the Vladimir region using the equipment she had with access to the Internet she sent the photographs, videos and audio recordings she had made during the filming to an unidentified participant of the extremist community for production and subsequent posting by unidentified persons on the Internet on the YouTube video hosting channel "Popular Politics" as well as on the Navalny's Team channel on the Telegram social network. "After the death of the extremist community leader Navalny on 16 February 2024, on the instructions of the extremist community leader Zhdanov, in order to discredit the current government and increase protest sentiments in the country, she arrived together with Navalny's mother" Lyudmila Navalnaia "in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District, where she filmed" Lyudmila Navalnaia between 20 and 22 February 2024. On 22 February 2024, "acting deliberately, on the instructions of the leaders of the extremist community Zhdanov I.Y. and other unidentified leaders and participants of the extremist community, being in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District on the territory of the town of Labytnangi and the town of Salekhard in exactly unspecified locations. At an unspecified location in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District in the territory of the towns of Labytnangi and Salekhard, using equipment with access to the Internet, Zhdanova I.Y. and other unidentified leaders and members of the extremist community sent the footage obtained during the video shootings to an unidentified member of the extremist community for the production and subsequent posting of videos on the Internet on the Navalny LIVE and Alexei Navalny channels of the YouTube video hosting website.
Latest event
June 13, 2026 — imprisonment begins
Recognition by rights defenders
- Recognised as a political prisoner — Memorial: Support for Political Prisoners, May 13, 2024
FACTUM stories
October 5, 2026
Antonina Favorskaya: 5½ years in prison in the FBK “extremist community” case
SOTAvision journalist Antonina Favorskaya is serving a five-and-a-half-year sentence in Penal Colony No. 3 in Russia’s Kostroma Region under Article 282.1(2) of the Criminal Code. Prosecutors tied her to Alexei Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation through video production and street interviews; the trial was closed. By September 11, 2026, she had spent more than 82 days in punishment cells after refusing prison sewing work.
Timeline
· Imprisonment begins
· Appeal ruling
upheld
· First-instance verdict
guilty verdict · 5 years 6 months
· Added to the Rosfinmonitoring list of “terrorists and extremists”
· Recognised as a political prisoner
Memorial: Support for Political Prisoners
· Preventive measure: placement in a temporary detention facility
· Persecution begins
The case of journalists' participation in activities of an extremist community
Criminal case
The case of journalists' participation in activities of an extremist community
- Case number
- 01-0934/2024
Other defendants in the case
- Konstantin Gabov — Imprisoned, 5 years 6 months
- Sergei Karelin — Imprisoned, 5 years 6 months
- Artem Kriger — Imprisoned, 5 years 6 months
Thematic group: The case of the extremist community led by Navalny; The case of journalists of participation in an extremist community
Write a letter
Facility: Penal colony No. 3, Kostroma Oblast
Address (in Russian, as written on the envelope)
156511, Костромская обл., Костромской район, пос. Прибрежный, ул. Мира, 1, ФКУ «ИК № 3 УФСИН России по Костромской области», Кравцова Антонина Юрьевна, 1989 г.р.
Details and sources
Full summary
She is a resident of Moscow and a journalist with SOTAvision. She was detained on 17 March 2024 in a cafe together with two other female journalists after visiting Alexei Navalny's grave at Borisovskoye cemetery, allegedly because of an anonymous call about a crime committed. The next day she was arrested for 10 days under the article on disobedience to the police (Article 19.3 of the Code of Administrative Offences). According to the law enforcers' version, she refused to show her documents, "waved her arms defiantly, grabbed the uniform and tried to run away". Favorskaia and another journalist Anastasia Musatova said in court that seven law enforcers (some of them were in plain clothes) burst into the establishment and immediately went towards them. When the journalists reached for their phones to put them in their pockets, the law enforcers started shouting about the prohibition of filming, and then knocked the phone out of Musatova's hands, while Favorskaia was thrown down on the table.
On 27 March, after serving an administrative sentence, Favorskaia was detained by officers of the Investigative Committee and taken away for questioning in a criminal case of participation in the activities of an extremist community. On the same day, law enforcers detained journalists Alexandra Astakhova and Anastasia Musatova, who came to the special detention centre to meet Favorskaia. All three were searched. Astakhova and Musatova were questioned and released as witnesses, Favorskaia was kept in the temporary detention cell. On 29 March she was taken into custody.
On 24 May, she was placed in the pre-trial detention centre on the preventive register as "a person who propagandises, professes or disseminates extremist ideology".
On 5 June it became known that the lawyer Fedor Sirosh, who represented Favorskaia's interests, was suspended from the case, because in 2019 he attended as a defender the interrogation of the lawyer of Navalny's team Evgeny Zamiatin in the case of money laundering (item "b" part 4 of article 174 of the Criminal Code).
On 15 April 2025, Favorskaia was sentenced to five and a half years in a general regime penal colony.
All fields of the record
- Citizenship
- Russia
Other people prosecuted under Article 282.1 part 2, Russian Criminal Code
Under the same article, not necessarily in the same case.