Drug possession and trafficking

Article 228 covers unlawful acquisition, storage, transport, manufacture or processing of narcotic drugs or psychotropic substances without intent to supply. Part 1 applies to a "significant" quantity and carries up to three years. Part 2, "large" quantity, carries three to ten years. Part 3, "especially large", carries ten to fifteen.

Article 228.1 covers unlawful production, sale or dispatch. It starts at four to eight years and rises through the parts to fifteen to twenty years or life imprisonment, depending on quantity, whether an organised group was involved, and whether the internet or a place of detention was used.

The quantity thresholds are set by Government Resolution No. 1002 of 2012 and differ enormously between substances. For some substances a "large" quantity is a fraction of a gram. This means that a difference invisible to the person carrying it — a slightly heavier package — can move a case between parts and add years.

Since there is rarely a witnessed transaction, intent to supply is usually inferred. The recurring building blocks are: quantity said to exceed personal use; the substance divided into separate packages; scales or packaging materials found; messages, photographs or coordinates on a phone; and the evidence of a test purchase conducted by the police.

Each of these is contestable. Packaging is equally consistent with the way the substance was bought. Quantity arguments have to be tied to the individual's actual pattern of use. Phone material is frequently misread, taken out of sequence, or attributed to a device several people used. And test purchases are governed by the Operational and Search Activities Act, which sets requirements that are often not met.

The seizure. A search or personal search has to be conducted with attesting witnesses, recorded properly, and the substance sealed at the scene. Breaks in that sequence are common — the same two attesting witnesses appearing across unrelated cases, packaging opened before the expert, a record signed after the fact. Evidence obtained in breach of the Code is inadmissible under Article 75.

The expert examination. Weight is determined by the state expert institution and it decides which part of the article applies. What was weighed — the pure substance or the whole mixture — the methodology used, and the chain of custody from seizure to laboratory are all legitimate targets. A case sitting just above a threshold is a case where the weight itself should be re-examined.

Provocation. Where the initiative for the transaction came from the authorities rather than the accused, the Supreme Court's Plenum Resolution No. 14 of 15 June 2006 is directly in point: conduct induced by the police cannot found a conviction. Repeated test purchases against the same person, after the offence is already documented, are especially vulnerable.

A person who voluntarily surrenders narcotic substances and actively assists in detecting or suppressing drug offences is exempt from criminal liability for the possession. The exemption is narrow: surrender during or after a search that would have found the substance anyway does not count as voluntary.

It matters because it is time-critical and because it is a decision that has to be taken in the first hours, usually before a retained lawyer is present. If the surrender happened, its circumstances need documenting immediately.

Expect pre-trial detention. Foreign nationality is treated as a flight risk and drug charges are treated as grave, so house arrest is granted rarely. Expect the case to be a priority one for the investigating authority.

Expect, too, that the sentence will be served in Russia and that removal from the country will follow release. And be aware that parole eligibility under Article 228.1 is set at three quarters of the sentence rather than the usual fractions — which makes commutation under Article 80 a more realistic first target than parole.