Cossack from Sochi challenged the refusal to recognize his right to land.

On October 18, Vladimir Galka filed a cassation appeal against the decisions of the courts that denied him recognition of rights to a land plot of 1078 square meters in the Blinovo microdistrict. Galka refers to a court decision from 2009, which confirmed his right to receive the land. According to his representative, the court act from 2011, cited by the courts in denying the claim, could not be found in the public database and archive.

As reported by "Caucasian Knot", on May 23, it became known that the court refused to return the land plot to Sochi Cossack Vladimir Galka. The Cossack could not achieve the return of the seized land plot through the court, which he has maintained for several decades. Galka filed an appeal against the decision of the Adler District Court, which refused to return the land plot to him. The lawyer noted that the first instance court ignored the fact that Galka had paid taxes for 30 years and bore the burden of maintaining the plot, although these circumstances, in the lawyer's opinion, are of key importance.

Sochi Cossack Vladimir Galka filed a cassation appeal on October 18 to the Fourth Cassation Court of General Jurisdiction through the Adler District Court of Sochi. He requests to annul the decision of the district court dated May 21, 2026, and the appellate ruling of the Krasnodar Regional Court dated September 22, 2026, which denied him recognition of rights to the plot with cadastral number 23:49:0402048:865.

According to the cassation appeal, the plot of 10.78 acres was formed and delineated in 2008 as part of a land mass of 11.4 hectares allocated to the Adler Cossack Circle for individual housing construction by decrees of the Sochi administration No. 27/1 dated January 18, 1993, and No. 142/2 dated February 19, 1996.

Vladimir Galka's right to receive the land, according to his position, was confirmed by the decision of the Adler District Court of Sochi dated December 11, 2009, in case No. 2-2905/09. In execution of this decision, the Sochi administration issued order No. 117-r dated April 16, 2010, to include Galka in the relevant lists.

However, subsequently, the plot was registered in the Unified State Register of Real Estate as municipal property. Galka claims that he was misled during the documentation process. According to him, the application written at the direction of the administration representatives was supposed to serve for formalizing the plot in his name, not the municipality's.

On July 14, 2026, the Cossack filed an appeal against the decision of the Adler District Court. The judicial panel of the Krasnodar Regional Court, chaired by Elena Zakharova, upheld the decision on September 22, leaving the appeal unsatisfied.

"I did not receive any notifications"

Galka claims that since 2008 he openly used the plot and was unaware of the cancellation of the court decision on which he relied to obtain the land.

With one hand, the court and the administration issued me the land in 2009-2010, and with the other hand, secretly, behind my back, canceled everything a couple of years later.

"I openly owned and used this plot for sixteen years since 2008, cultivated it, and was sure that the document was just a formality. The other thirty-four Cossacks from our list successfully formalized their similar plots into ownership. But with me, they staged a performance: it turns out that with one hand, the court and the administration issued me the land in 2009-2010, and with the other hand, secretly, behind my back, canceled everything a couple of years later? I did not receive any summons, no notifications!" - Galka told the correspondent of "Caucasian Knot."

He believes that the actions of the administration led to the loss of the opportunity to formalize the plot into ownership. Galka and his representative Olga Koryagina suggest that there may have been violations during the land formalization process and raise the question of possible fraud.

The 2011 decision could not be found by Galka's side

In denying Galka's claim, the first and appellate instance courts referred to the order of the Sochi administration No. 146-r dated May 12, 2012, which canceled the order to include the Cossack in the lists for receiving land, which, according to Galka, he also never saw. According to the administration's position, the basis for the cancellation was the cassation ruling of the Krasnodar Regional Court dated December 20, 2011, in case No. 33-29604/2011, which allegedly canceled the decision of the Adler District Court dated December 11, 2009.

Galka's representative Olga Koryagina, participating in the case along with lawyer Petr Dmitruk, stated that she and the lawyer could not find the text of the ruling from 2011 in the public database of judicial acts and court archives.

"We conducted a thorough search for this judicial act from 2011, which officials and judges refer to. Its text is simply not in the public database! It is also not in the court archives. We wrote requests. Moreover, from the case card No. 33-29604/2011, it follows that a completely different person, citizen Kudryavtsev V.V., appealed to the regional court, and the case itself was sent for reconsideration to the first instance court," - Koryagina reported.

According to Galka's representative, Kudryavtsev denies that he appealed to the court regarding the seizure of the plot from Galka in favor of the administration. Koryagina and her client believe that the circumstances of the 2011 case require further investigation. Koryagina also noted that, according to her data, information about this case on the website of the Krasnodar Regional Court was changed on January 16, 2026, during the period when Galka began to send complaints and contact the administration for documents. The Cossack's representative believes that the courts, when considering the dispute, should have verified the relevant circumstances and requested archival materials, rather than referring to a court decision that no one has seen.

The position of the administration and the courts

During the court hearings, representatives of the Sochi administration Yulia Savchuk and Natalia Usenko insisted on the legality of registering the municipal property on the plot. Among the arguments of the administration was that the land, free from third-party rights, was subject to inclusion in the register of municipal property.

The administration representatives also pointed out what they considered to be an improper method of protecting the right: Galka challenged the actions of the authorities, rather than presenting an independent claim for recognition of ownership rights.

Judge of the Adler District Court Sergey Shepilov and the judicial panel of the Krasnodar Regional Court, chaired by Elena Zakharova, agreed with the arguments presented in the judicial acts. The decisions state that the procedure for granting land plots is regulated, in particular, by Articles 39.1 and 39.2 of the Land Code of the Russian Federation, and previous orders of the administration lost their force in 2012. Galka disputes these conclusions in his cassation appeal. He insists that the courts should have taken into account the 2009 decision and verified the circumstances related to its subsequent alleged cancellation.

The lawyer pointed out issues requiring verification

Lawyer Sergiy Akhmetov, who reviewed the materials of the court decisions, believes that the arguments presented in Galka's cassation appeal deserve verification by a higher court.

In his opinion, when considering the dispute, it is important to establish how the order to include Galka in the lists for receiving the plot was canceled and what judicial acts served as the basis for this decision. Akhmetov also believes that the court should have assessed the argument about the open use of the plot for a long time and the circumstances related to the formalization of land by other participants in the list.

Separately, the lawyer drew attention to the question of choosing the method of judicial protection. In his opinion, when considering the case, it is necessary to verify how justified the refusal of the claim was on this basis, taking into account the stated requirements and applicable explanations of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation. Akhmetov believes that the circumstances of the case may also require separate verification by law enforcement agencies. He recommended that Galka contact the Investigative Committee and the Ministry of Internal Affairs with a statement about possible violations during the formalization of the land plot.