Taxi driver gets seven years for spying for Russia

On Thursday, October 31, the Riga City Court found taxi driver Sergejs Sidorovs guilty of spying for Russia and sentenced him to seven years' imprisonment and two years' probationary supervision, LETA reports.

The indictment states that in October 2022, a channel "Baltic Anti-Fascists" and related channels were set up on the Telegram platform to collect information to help Russia and its services target Latvian security.

The Telegram channels maintained by the Baltic Anti-Fascists regularly contained appeals to people in Latvia to gather information that would be of interest to Russian intelligence and security services. There were also appeals for information on any daily developments in the Latvian defense system, Latvia's international cooperation, NATO defense plans, practical activities of NATO member states on Latvian territory, as well as information on support activities for Ukraine in Latvia.

In some cases, the messages explicitly stated that this information would be passed on to the Russian Investigative Committee or the Federal Security Service. 

In response to such messages, Sidorovs agreed to collect intelligence for ideological reasons, knowing that it would be passed on to the Russian services, the indictment says.

On the first occasion, on January 4, 2023, Sidorovs, while driving his car past the Russian Embassy, filmed with his phone and sent a video via Telegram to a person not specified in the indictment, which showed that at that time there were operational vehicles and two fire trucks at the Embassy.

On March 10, Sidorovs sent the same person information that there was a lot of military activity in Riga that day, "that everyone was going from home to the bases and not to one particular base, but to all of them". Sidorovs himself also allegedly took military personnel to two bases.

On April 26, Sidorovs sent a message to another person on Telegram that a military ship had entered the port of Riga and was being unloaded at the closed quay. Sidorovs also sent the location on the mobile application "Waze".

On May 9, he sent two photographs to the person, one of which showed a Ukrainian flag in the window of the house and the other the address of the house. On the same day, Sidorovs sent information that he did not have any pictures, but that he had noticed the military in Baloži near the drone base for the third or fourth day.

On May 12, Sidorovs reported that no Ukrainian petrol tankers were seen at the port, although they were constantly present. On the same day, he sent a photo showing a sandy area and a black car behind a fence in Uzvaras Park. Sidorovs stated that demolition work was being carried out on the Soviet monument and claimed that the personal car of the tractor drivers carrying out the demolition was hidden among the piles of sand.

The indictment further alleges that Sidorov sent information to Telegram about visible warships and that, according to the observations of other taxi drivers, the airport was full of military personnel. He also sent a photo of a car with a sticker of Putin's head crossed out on the luggage compartment. The accused also sent a photo of a shop window in the center of Riga showing a sign in the colors of the Ukrainian flag with the words in Russian "Russian military ship, f**k off".

On June 11, Sidorovs sent information that on that day there had been many orders from military personnel traveling from Riga to the Lielvārde base. Sidorovs alleged that the service personnel were under the influence of alcohol and were being driven to the base from bars.

On June 20, Sidorovs sent information that the oil terminal was full of "Ukrainian tourists", asking, inter alia,

"if there was anything that could be put there that could explode or catch fire in an hour".

Sidorovs said that he had two places where he wanted to put explosive objects: he wanted to blow up the terminal, and burn the trucks and the drone site. The addressee of the message replied that such an operation should be considered well. Sidorovs replied that he had thought it all through and just needed the ingredients. The other party to the correspondence replied to Sidorovs that the ingredients for an attack needed to be gathered in Latvia, that it was a complicated process, and that such things should not be discussed on Telegram.

The indictment further shows that Sidorovs agreed that the ingredients needed to be collected in Latvia, but asked if there was anyone in Latvia who had already collected them and could pass them on to him, sending the location of a potential pick-up point. The contact replied that they did not have such information, to which Sidorovs replied "Too bad".

The indictment also shows that in July, the contact person contacted Sidorovs and asked him whether he had many friends among taxi drivers, as he needed to conduct surveillance of the airport. The contact also gave further instructions on how to monitor and track arrivals at the airport.

Sidorovs was also charged with inciting national and ethnic hatred for writing on the internet that Latvians are fascists and for reacting to the Freedom Monument, illuminated in the colors of the Ukrainian flag, with a vomit emoji. He has also posted other hateful messages on the internet.

Before the first hearing, the taxi driver said he did not consider himself a spy because he had not passed on anything "spying", such as information about military bases. Sidorovs claimed that he had simply corresponded with Viktorija Matule, who is currently accused in the criminal proceedings of the Baltic Anti-Fascists criminal organization and is most likely in Russia.

The man was detained by the State Security Service (VDD) on August 15, 2023. Several data carriers were found in the taxi driver's residence, as well as symbols of his pro-Kremlin ideology, such as Russian and USSR flags.

The criminal proceedings against the man were separate from the "Baltic Anti-Fascists" criminal proceedings, in which six Latvian citizens were charged.

 

Seen a mistake?

Select text and press Ctrl+Enter to send a suggested correction to the editor

Select text and press Report a mistake to send a suggested correction to the editor

Related articles

More

Most important