Andrei worked as a psychologist at a Belarussian district center (working with drug users in a methadone substitution therapy room, psychodiagnosing hospital patients, working on a psychological emergency hotline).
Before 2020. Andrei didn't know at all where the ROVD was located in the city. In 2020, however, everything changed. The first time law enforcement officers came to work for him was in the spring of 2021, because he might have been in the “delinquency zone” according to his phone billing. It all worked out at the time.
The second meeting with the “officers” occurred when an administrative case was filed against him for reposting an article. “In order to ensure the conduct of the administrative process” Andrei was detained before trial and spent six hours in a holding cell, after which he was transferred to the TDF.
This was Andrei's first administrative case in his life. His family and friends hoped for a fine, but the judge felt that the defendant's actions carried “increased public danger” and should be punished with administrative arrest. In protest against the lawlessness, Andrei went on a hunger strike in the courtroom. He was not even allowed to say goodbye and attend the funeral of a relative. Despite the hunger strike, Andrei was billed “for food in the TDF,” which he had to pay.
After his release, he was notified that he had been fired from his job. About a month later the same fate befell Andrei's wife, the head of a model vocal studio. She was given an administrative arrest of 15 days. Then she was fired from her job, despite the fact that she was on leave at her own expense at the time of the arrest.
So the whole family was effectively left without a single source of income.
How much is needed?
1,100€ — food costs, utilities.