MOSCOW -- A former Russian police officer who created a group on social media to report problems caused by police officers has been sentenced to five years in prison on charges he says are trumped-up.
A court in Moscow sentenced Vladimir Vorontsov on August 2 after finding him guilty of extortion, insulting an authority, and pornography.
Investigators said Vorontsov blackmailed a police official and a woman in 2017 in two separate cases by demanding significant amounts of money from them for not publishing their private photos, which he ended up publishing.
Vorontsov, who was arrested in May 2020, has rejected all of the charges against him, calling them retaliation by the authorities for his activities.
Vorontsov's Police Ombudsman online group created on the VKontakte social media network has almost 400,000 subscribers. The group covers issues related to rights of both police officers and those of victims of police brutality.
