Teenager given four-year suspended sentence for ‘making explosives’ and ‘calls for extremism’ in Russia’s Yaroslavl region

The Rybinsk city court of the Yaroslavl region of Russia has ruled that a 17-year-old man be given four years of suspended sentence for two counts of making explosives, two counts of illegal storing and carrying of explosives, and calls for extremist activities on the Internet, the Kommersant newspaper reports, citing the court filings. 

The teenager has also been given four years of probation. 

The young man was detained in December 2021. The Federal Security Service (FSB) claimed that he had planned to carry out “resonant actions” in the Yaroslavl region and was involved in the illicit trafficking of means of destruction, explosive substances, and explosive devices. In the video of the detention of the teenager, the law enforcement agents showed a pack of Bengal lights and a rare handgun. 

The law enforcement agents said that the at-the-time 16-year-old resident of the Kamenniki village of the Rybinsk district had made the explosive substance, triacetone triperoxide, himself and that he had been storing it at his place of residence illegally. Furthermore, FSB declared that the teenager was a member of a private Telegram channel that united “radically inclined citizens” and “called for violent actions against law enforcement agents and government officials”. 

In the video published by Telegram channel 112, the teenager said that he would cooperate with the investigation and that he learned how to assemble explosive devices thanks to YouTube tutorials.