Ukrainian citizen; lived in Melitopol (occupied part of the Zaporizhzhya region of Ukraine). At the end of May 2022, was detained while buying shawarma and taken to the commandant's office. Popov later shared that there he had been tortured with electric shocks. The military "were trying to elicit some information" from him, but Popov could not understand them. He was released; however, his passport was taken away. The next time he was kidnapped in April 2023, two days before he was due to get evacuated from the city. In June, his former cellmate contacted his parents and told them that Popov was being held in the basement of the local military commandant's office. According to the cellmate, they had been beaten, barely fed, and only given water once every couple of days. He said that Popov could not sit up, was extremely exhausted, and frequently whispered "I want to eat". A man who identified himself as a military police officer then told Popov's parents that he had been detained because of photographs of military equipment. In July, Popov was hospitalized for emaciation. At 1m 95cm tall, he weighed 40 kilograms and had little awareness of what was happening to him. With the help of a ward mate, he managed to contact his parents. In a conversation with his mother, he described what had happened after the abduction as follows: "Mum, you said there was hell, and I was in hell. I was so afraid to go to sleep. I was afraid that they would come and strangle and kill me. I was so very thirsty, but they wouldn't give me water. Most of all, I was hungry. They beat me up so badly. Once they beat me up so badly that I couldn't use the bathroom for four days. Mum, why?" Popov also said that the Russian military beat him, interrogated him, and forced him to sign some papers. Investigative source Important Stories reports that due to hunger, constant abuse, and lack of treatment, Popov's disorder worsened: he started to lose memory as well as his grip on reality. On August 2, 2023, Popov's father received a call from the Investigative Committee and was told that they were releasing his son due to the lack of corpus delicti. His father was bringing Popov home from the hospital, when in the courtyard they were approached by military officers. One of them handed Popov a bag to put on his head and then they wrapped it with duct tape. Popov was taken away. His father called the Investigative Committee (IC), but they told him that they could not help him because they had no influence on the military commandant's office. Then he filed a statement of abduction. The Investigative Committee opened a case. Later, in the fall of the same year, Every Human Being, an independent human rights organization founded in 2022 after the outbreak of a full-scale war, received a response from the FSB stating that Popov had not been detained and no investigative actions were being conducted against him. In December 2023, the abduction case was dropped. Popov Sr. was then summoned to the IC: he was shown a photograph of his son sent by the FSB, according to an IC officer. In the photo, Leonid is holding a piece of paper saying "Everything is all right with me! I refuse to report my whereabouts", accompanied by his signature and the date: 07.12.23. For almost a year, there had been no news about Popov. Then, in November 2024, it became known that a case of espionage was brought against him. According to the document sent by the FSB to Every Human Being, the case was opened on August 15, 2024.