Four People Detained After Searches of Eksmo Management

Four People Detained After Searches of Eksmo Management

Eksmo publishing house CEO Yevgeny Kapyev, the financial director, the distribution director, and the communications director were taken for questioning at the Investigative Committee. This was reported to the channel “Ostorozhno, Novosti” by Ekaterina Kozhanova, director of the strategic communications department at Eksmo-AST.

The investigative actions are connected to the “publishers’ case”: almost a year ago, in May 2025, security forces carried out mass searches of employees of Eksmo, Popcorn Books, and Individuum in an extremism case over the distribution of books from the publishing house Popcorn Books, including “Summer in a Pioneer Tie” and “What the Swallow Is Silent About.”

At the time, Pavel Ivanov, sales director for the publishing houses Popcorn Books and Individuum, warehouse manager Artyom Vakhlyaev, and executive director Dmitry Protopopov were placed under house arrest.

▶️ How the authorities are fighting literature

2025 became the most repressive year in the history of Russia’s modern book industry. Most often, the pretext was “LGBT propaganda.”

Under this article, bookstores began receiving large fines: for example, in May 2025, “Podpisnye Izdaniya” was fined 800,000 rubles, and in July “Falanster” was fined the same amount.

At the same time, a criminal case over “LGBT propaganda” was opened against employees of Popcorn Books and Individuum. As a result, the publishing house Popcorn Books announced it was closing.

We wrote more about the authorities’ pressure on the book industry here.

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Searches of Eksmo Publishing House Management Under Way in Case Over LGBT Literature

Searches of the management of the Eksmo publishing house are under way in Moscow in a case over the distribution of LGBT literature among minors. REN TV reports this. According to the outlet, the searches are taking place at several addresses under the article on organizing the activities of an extremist…