"I always knew that I was working next to the Knight advocate"

He defended Izvestia in front of the American public and gave our newspaper his first interview. He proposed hanging criminals and achieved a moratorium on the death penalty in Russia. He represented the interests of the families of Vladimir Vysotsky and academician Andrei Sakharov. He helped grant amnesty to former Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR Alexander Lukyanov. He defended Pavel Borodin, the managing director of the President of the Russian Federation, Anatoly Serdyukov, the former Minister of Defense, and even the criminal boss "Yaponchik". One of the country's most respected lawyers, Henry Padva, died on the night of February 10th. About how his colleagues remembered the Honored Lawyer of Russia, see the Izvestia article.

"A great sense of humor also sometimes became a procedural weapon"

Henry Padva lived a great life in every sense: he died at the age of 94. For Russian lawyers, this was a "man of the epoch", a true legend of the Russian legal profession.

He was convinced that service to society should be based on the principles of justice, lawyer Alexander Hofstein told Izvestia. He has worked hand in hand with Padva for decades, starting with his internship as a student.

— I always knew that I was working next to a knight advocate, for whom the idea of justice in every case went beyond this case. He always understood that the work of a lawyer who seeks a fair decision regarding his client is always serving not only this client, but also society," he stressed.

According to Hofstein, Heinrich Padva sought to convey to his students the principle of service to society through every legal case, which became the motto of his professional activity. And their friendship and professional partnership have been tested for strength and dedication.

— He was a great man. He was a great lawyer. He was a great citizen. And he was a great friend. Everyone who was gifted with his friendship felt that there was more than just a friend in his life, there was a guardian angel,— said Alexander Hofstein.

Henrikh Padva's professional path has become a benchmark of dedication, Vladimir Gruzdev, Chairman of the Board of the Association of Lawyers of Russia (AYUR), told Izvestia.

—Henrikh Pavlovich has made an invaluable contribution to the development of the Russian legal system and the strengthening of civil society institutions," he said. — For all colleagues and close people, he will forever remain an example of the deepest erudition and unwavering loyalty to professional duty. This is an irreparable loss for the entire legal world. The bright memory of Henry Pavlovich will forever remain in our hearts and in the history of Russian law.

Padva had a unique gift — to turn legal defense into a high art based on a deep knowledge of the law and a subtle understanding of human nature, said former Prime Minister of Russia, Chairman of the AYUR Sergey Stepashin.

"We say goodbye to a man who proved by his deeds that advocacy is primarily about serving the truth,— he stressed. — I offer my sincere condolences to everyone who knew Henrikh Pavlovich and to whom he was dear. His bright memory will live on in his works, in the hearts of his colleagues and loved ones.

Genrikh Padva, being a managing partner and a member of the Board of partners of the Padva and Partners Bureau, has educated a galaxy of lawyers for whom his life path will always serve as a moral and professional guideline, Sergey Stepashin added.

Anatoly Kucherena joined the Moscow City Bar Association in 1993, and Henrikh Pavlovich became one of his guides to the profession.

— I came when I was very young, and when I took my first steps, of course, I kept my eyes on the leading figures of the legal profession. And one of them was just Henry Pavlovich Padva. I must say that he greeted me quite kindly. And I really liked that, despite the fact that he was already quite famous in those years, he behaved quite modestly," Anatoly Kucherena shared with Izvestia. — He told some stories about his cases, how he participated in these cases, and for me, then a young lawyer, it was extremely interesting.

Pavel Krasheninnikov, chairman of the State Duma Committee on State Construction and Legislation, in an interview with Izvestia, called Henrikh Padva one of the most powerful lawyers of both the Soviet era and the post-Soviet period.

— His distinctive features are knowledge of the subject and personality. When he spoke at the trial, he knew the case itself and studied the personalities, knew who the participants in the process were, understood who the judge was, who the prosecutor was, so every word he said hit the nail on the head," said the parliamentarian. — Besides, Padva had a great sense of humor, which also sometimes became a procedural weapon.

"Humanity towards a criminal is cruelty towards his victim"

Henrikh Padva often became a participant in high-profile cases or decisions that affect the country. The lawyer often appeared on the pages of the newspaper Izvestia.

So, in 1987, his first interview was published in the newspaper. In November 1984, a note was published about Rafael Gregorian, a citizen of the United States, owner of the California International Trade (KIT) trading company, under the heading "Two-faced Merchant." It spoke about the activities of the owner of the KIT company, which was engaged in the sale of medical and laboratory equipment in the country. The Soviet Union accounted for most of its sales.

When trade relations with him were terminated, Gregorian, in interviews with American and other media outlets, accused Izvestia of distorting facts. Heinrich Padva defended the newspaper.

"He did not hesitate to misinform the American public by distributing a distorted text of the article "Two-faced Merchant" in Russian. This will be discussed in court. Obviously, "amendments" were deliberately made to the text," the lawyer said at the time.

In a 1988 Izvestia article on the discussion of the draft Fundamentals of Criminal Law, Henry Padva noted that "there is no universal kindness, and humanity to a criminal is cruelty to his victim."

"You read your newspaper. What are we getting at if the phrase "repeatedly convicted has been detained..." is increasingly appearing in crime reports. We are getting to the point where endless amnesties and conditional early releases lead to criminals no longer being afraid of prison. How many people can you fool with this democracy and perestroika? An emergency decree is needed now. We need a decree on combating bandits, murderers, embezzlers, and we need to introduce the public death penalty by hanging. If we don't force people to work honestly and selflessly, as during the war, we will squander all our gains."

At the same time, it was the work of Heinrich Padva that predetermined the introduction of a moratorium on the use of the death penalty in Russia. The lawyer defended the accused of murder. According to the law, the defendant could apply for a jury trial, but such a practice had not yet been introduced in the city court. This circumstance served as the reason for the lawyer's appeal to the Constitutional Court of Russia in defense of the accused. As a result, after the decision of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation in 1997, a moratorium on the death penalty was adopted in Russia.

Over the years, Henry Padva has defended a huge number of public figures, representatives of show business, senior officials and organizations. For example, former Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR Anatoly Lukyanov. He was arrested on August 29, 1991, and spent more than a year in the Matrosskaya Tishina detention center along with other defendants in the case of the State Committee for the State of Emergency (GCHR).

The Izvestia newspaper actively covered this case. In one of the articles, the lawyer explained why he decided to defend Lukyanov.

"I took over the defense of Anatoly Ivanovich together with lawyer Alexander Hofstein. He confirmed to me his position on the actions of the Emergency Committee, which he had expressed earlier in the country's parliament. I have no reason not to believe him. After all, I undertook to defend Lukyanov because I deeply doubt his involvement in the conspiracy," he noted.

As a result, Lukyanov was granted amnesty.

Another high-profile case was the defense of a suspect in the murder of priest Alexander Me.

"A suspect has been detained. At N. Two lawyers are the experienced and venerable Heinrich Padva and the young but already quite famous defender Alexander Hofstein. This fairly well-coordinated legal tandem defended Anatoly Lukyanov in the GKCHP case at the time. The lawyers took up the case at the request of the suspect's relatives. Padva and Hofstein are ready to fulfill their professional duty and will defend it by all legal and available means," Izvestia wrote in 1994.

In the service of the law: lawyer Heinrich Padva died

The lawyer died at the age of 95.

Other people Padva defended included crime boss Vyacheslav Ivankov, known as "The Jap," the family of academician Andrei Sakharov, and the family of actor and bard Vladimir Vysotsky. He also defended the interests of Pavel Borodin, the managing director of the President of the Russian Federation, Anatoly Bykov, the former head of the board of directors of the Krasnoyarsk Aluminum Plant, and Anatoly Serdyukov, the former Minister of Defense.

In the Opinion column on the pages of Izvestia, Henry Padva noted that the principles of equality of the parties and their competitiveness in criminal proceedings were solemnly proclaimed in the criminal procedure legislation of Soviet Russia.

"In fact, this declaration was a fig leaf on the sin of Soviet justice, which, in essence, was undoubtedly not modern democratic justice, but police justice. The accusatory bias prevailed unchallenged in almost all courts of the vast state. And one of its manifestations was that for many years, during the reign of the old criminal procedure law, the testimony of people obtained during the preliminary investigation, obtained in the silence of the investigative rooms, secretly, behind the scenes, was celebrated in justice. And although during this period, as well as now, the adversarial nature of the process was declared, of course, there could be no question of any competition," the lawyer believed.

Shortly before his death, the lawyer started a Telegram channel in which he promised to leave notes "about the practice of law at the turn of the XX–XXI centuries, about the time when law in Russia was formed not only in courtrooms, but also in specific cases, legal positions and personal responsibility of a lawyer."

"In recent weeks, I've been sorting through the archive — old files, documents, publications, notes. What was once part of the current work, today allows us to take a fresh look at the path traveled and how the practice of law was formed," the lawyer wrote on December 17, 2025.

And up until February, he wrote on the channel about his cases, both successful and those that became "the collapse of hopes for a favorable result."

Heinrich Padva left his last post on February 7. And on February 10, a message appeared in it, signed by Eleonora Sergeeva, Deputy managing Director of the Padva and Partners Law Firm.

"We have always been proud that Henrikh Pavlovich was a teacher, friend, and colleague for us," she wrote. — Each of us could come to his house, he knew our families, our children. He knew our strengths and weaknesses. He could both praise and scold. He could listen and hear. He loved us."

The farewell to Henry Padva will take place on February 12 in Moscow in the funeral hall at Marshal Timoshenko St., 25.