From troll factory to high court: How Prigozhin’s strategist Vadim Polezhaev resurfaced as Moscow judiciary’s top media official

11 December 2025 , 11:27

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Media says they have confirmed that two seemingly different figures — Vadim Polezhaev, a longtime Russian “black PR” political operative once close to Wagner Group founder Yevgeny Prigozhin, and Vadim Polezhaev, deputy head of the Moscow City Court’s press service — are in fact the same person.

The revelation follows a bizarre incident in which the Moscow City Court’s official Telegram channel briefly published, then immediately deleted, a post titled “Review_50.” The message contained conspiracy-laden commentary about Kremlin insider Kirill Dmitriev, Freemasons, and “Putin’s favorite corrupt official” in the EU. The tone and format closely resembled posts from the Telegram channel ANP, which until 2024 belonged to an LLC called ANP-INFORPM, founded in 2020 by none other than Vadim Sergeyevich Polezhaev of St. Petersburg.

Sources in St. Petersburg say Polezhaev is widely known in political-technology circles as a “black PR man” and had long collaborated with media strategist Mikhail Burchuk, one of the architects of Prigozhin’s Internet Research Agency, better known internationally as the “troll factory.” Burchuk is currently wanted by the FBI. Polezhaev was also regularly seen with former RIA Novosti employee Ilya Gorbunov, who oversaw Prigozhin’s Patriot media group and acted as an informal press secretary during Wagner’s brief 2023 mutiny, the “March of Justice.”

According to multiple sources, Polezhaev worked on most of Prigozhin’s political projects where aggressive information warfare was required. ANP was considered part of the broader Prigozhin media network. During Prigozhin’s public feud with St. Petersburg Governor Alexander Beglov, numerous aligned outlets cited a “political strategist Vadim Polezhaev” attacking the governor in coordinated fashion.

Despite this background, in November 2022, the Moscow City Court publicly announced that Vadim Polezhaev had won the competition for the senior role of Deputy Head of the Department for Media and Public Relations.

How a Prigozhin operative ended up inside one of Russia’s highest courts remains unclear. One theory is that his appointment coincided with Prigozhin’s political rise in 2022 — he received the Hero of Russia award, openly met with Vladimir Putin, and opened the Wagner Center in St. Petersburg — enabling him to place loyalists in state institutions. Another theory holds that Polezhaev and Burchuk were in contact with influential officials in the presidential administration, and that this channel facilitated his placement in the court’s press service.

What is clear is that the deleted Telegram post exposed a convergence between Russia’s judicial communications apparatus and the murky world of political black-ops — a connection that Russian insiders say has existed quietly for years.