The court agreed with the lawyers' arguments regarding Diana Tsipinova's innocence.

The Supreme Court of Kabardino-Balkaria, after reviewing video footage from the scene of the incident at the Ministry of Internal Affairs department, rejected the prosecutor's request for a review and upheld Diana Tsipinova's acquittal in the case of assaulting a security officer. The court rarely sides with the defense, only when egregious violations are evident, according to lawyers.

As reported by "Caucasian Knot," on December 1, 2025, the Urvan District Court, having retried Diana Tsipinova's case, again acquitted her. The prosecution had requested a 2.5-year prison sentence for Tsipinova, according to the Union of Young Lawyers' Telegram channel. The prosecutor's office has challenged the second acquittal of Kabardino-Balkaria lawyer Diana Tsipinova, demanding that the case be remanded for a new trial. Tsipinova's defense team criticized the agency's position. On February 18, the Supreme Court of Kabardino-Balkaria began hearing the appeal. The lawyer is being defended by five colleagues, who called for the decision to be upheld.

The Supreme Court of the Kabardino-Balkarian Republic rejected the prosecutor's appeal against the acquittal handed down for the third time in December 2025 by the Urvan District Court to Diana Tsipinova, one of the defense attorneys, Suren Natanov, told a "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

According to him, on February 18, the defense filed a motion to examine video recordings from the Urvan District Department of Internal Affairs' surveillance cameras and the phones of the participants in the incident. "The court granted the defense's motion, and the video recording was examined. Today, the court itself was convinced that there is no evidence that Tsipinova failed to fulfill her direct responsibility to protect the rights of a person who, in accordance with Article 48 of the Constitution, has the right to defense. And there is no evidence that the police officer who obstructed Tsipinova's entry into the Urvan District Department of Internal Affairs acted in accordance with the federal law on police and the corresponding order of the Ministry of Internal Affairs—he failed to identify himself or explain her rights. There is no evidence that Tsipinova's motive was revenge for the lawful actions of a police officer, or vice versa. From the evidence examined, it is clear that Tsipinova's motive was personal hostility toward the man who held her hands and prevented her from taking her phone, which contained evidence of unlawful actions by officers to deny her entry and push her out with the unjustified use of violence, as well as information constituting attorney-client privilege. "She asked, 'Give me the phone,' and reacted reflexively, like a woman, to the insults and clearly illegal actions of the victim. Moreover, this person (the victim) was wearing an untucked T-shirt without any insignia indicating affiliation with the Ministry of Internal Affairs, kept his hands in his pockets, and did not introduce himself, so Tsipinova did not know that she was in fact a police officer," the lawyer noted.

With proper procedural oversight by the prosecutor's office, the case against Tsipinova should never have been opened.

Speaking about the role of the prosecutor's office, Natanov noted that the state prosecution "was fulfilling its prosecutorial role."

"This was an adversarial process in which the parties presented their evidence. However, with proper procedural oversight by the prosecutor's office, the case against Tsipinova should never have been opened, and the criminal case that was opened, with its vast array of available evidence proving her innocence, should have been dismissed at the preliminary investigation stage and should not have been sent to court," he emphasized. he.

The Kabardino-Balkarian Republic is a complex region, where ties, including between security forces, are very strong, and they often cover for each other. Furthermore, if a lawyer is found not guilty, all eyes turn to the police – someone has to be found guilty.

Lawyer Ivan Pavlov, commenting on the situation with the appeal of Tsipinova's sentence, noted that the court very rarely sides with the defense.

"Only when egregious violations are evident on the part of the investigation or the prosecution does the court begin to listen to the defense. Another question is whether such a verdict will hold up – where on one side there is a private individual and his lawyer, and on the other an official with his administrative resources, in a higher court. There was a high probability that it would not hold up." This applies not only to this case, but to criminal cases in general. Currently, the acquittal rate in Russia is five times lower than, for example, in Kazakhstan. Furthermore, the Kabardino-Balkarian Republic is a complex region where ties, including between law enforcement officials, are very strong, and they often cover for each other. Furthermore, if a lawyer is found not guilty, all eyes turn to the police – someone has to be found guilty,” he noted.

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The Tsipinova case has become an example of the prosecutor's abuse of the right to appeal.

The prosecution, unlike the defense, can initiate repeated cycles of case review until a guilty verdict is reached or until procedural options are exhausted. The prosecutor's office is exploiting this bias in the Tsipinova case, the lawyers noted.

The lawyer did not consider the prosecutor's office's repeated appeals of acquittals to higher courts to be valid. abuse of rights, emphasizing that the defense often tries to appeal the verdicts.

"Each side tries to convince the court of their case. "The prosecutor's office can't simply say, 'Okay, that's all we've got,' after convincing the court that a person is guilty—that would be inconsistent," he said.
 
However, Pavlov believed that the overturning of acquittals by higher courts has a negative effect on lower courts.

"They see that it's easier to deliver a guilty verdict, since even if it's overturned by a higher court, there won't be any claims against them, while an acquittal will, in most cases, be appealed and, in all likelihood, overturned," the lawyer noted.

As a reminder, in May 2020, Diana Tsipinova was among three lawyers who volunteered to provide legal assistance to her colleague Ratmir Zhilokov after his arrest in Nartkala. They arrived at the police station and were unable to get access to Zhilokov for 40 minutes.

Security officers were upset that the lawyers were filming and forcibly ejected them from the building. According to investigators, Tsipinova struck the police officers while trying to get to the detained Zhilokov.

The use of force against lawyers in Kabardino-Balkaria and their subsequent criminal prosecution is considered extraordinary by the professional community, although it is not an isolated incident. Violation of the right to legal representation. href="https://www.kavkaz-uzel.eu/articles/350239/">poses a potential threat to every citizen, according to lawyers interviewed by the "Caucasian Knot."