Yekaterinburg LGBTQ center that got homophobic Internet users fined receives threats of violence from hate group

Alla Chikinda, a representative of the LGBT Resource Center in Yekaterinburg, told Komsomolskaya Pravda that the center has received messages threatening to cause “something very unfortunate” to happen to its employees if the center does not close by August 1. The letter also demanded that the center and its employees donate all of their funds, including personal funds, to a well-known charity organization. The sender identified themselves as a member of Pila, which claims to be a nationwide movement against LGBTQ people. Pila has reportedly offered up to $5,000 to individuals willing to kidnap and torture gay residents of Russia.

According to Chikinda, the Resource Center has submitted a request to local police for the letter to be investigated as a hate crime. The center previously persuaded local courts to issue three fines, the first such fines ever issued in the Sverdlovsk region, for homophobic comments made on the social media site VKontakte.