The wrong man is in the dock at the second trial of former Russian oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky. It should be President Dmitry Medvedev.
His crime? Failing to break the vengeful grip of his mentor Vladimir Putin, on a case that has become a symbol of political abuse and corruption in Russia.
This isn't about the vigilance of Russian prosecutors, notable mainly for their spectacular failures -- such as not finding the real killers of Anna Politkovskaya, the journalist and Putin critic killed on his birthday in 2006.
The case against Khodorkovsky is exhibit A in an indictment of the "legal nihilism" in Russia that Medvedev, a former law professor who's been in office just one year, had promised to fix.
What makes this case reek of vendetta is the relentless humiliation of Russia's once-richest man.
It began with his arrest in October 2003, at gunpoint, by masked men. He was convicted in 2005 of fraud and tax evasion, given an eight-year sentence in a Siberian labor camp, and was stripped of his company OAO Yukos, which was sold off at bargain prices to pay back taxes.
Even in the prison colony on the Chinese border, Khodorkovsky is routinely singled out for disfavor. He was denied parole for failing to attend a sewing class, and got thrown into solitary confinement for granting an interview.
Hitting Bottom
The only charge he has managed to duck is an accusation of sexual assault.
Khodorkovsky is as low as you can get, and yet the Russian prosecutors are still coming at him. Now he is accused of embezzling $24.6 billion from Yukos and laundering another $7.5 billion in profits. His lawyers dismiss the charges as "laughable," but they could -- and probably will -- add 22 years to his sentence.
Why? Because this is still Putin's Russia, where all that counts in both business and politics is loyalty and subservience to the Kremlin. The resurrection of the Khodorkovsky case, at a time when Russia desperately needs Western credit, is proof that the system is still rigged.
The issue in the courtroom this month isn't Khodorkovsky's guilt or innocence. How Russia's billionaires got rich, and whether they did so legally, is a question that is both murky and moot.
The point is that this is selective justice, where one culprit has been singled out for crimes committed by many. Tax fraud and embezzlement in Russia? Who out there is shocked? Certainly not the oligarchs who are part of Putin's inner circle, who are now scurrying to sell off their French villas and yachts to pay off corporate debts.
Political Target
It was clear early on that Khodorkovsky was targeted for political reasons because of his own ambitions as both an oil tycoon and as a potential rival to Putin. Either way, this was Putin's fight, not Medvedev's.
That's why the issue now is not Khodorkovsky, but Medvedev, Putin's hand-picked successor who was elected with promises to reform the system he was due to inherit.
There were hopes that Medvedev would break free of his predecessor's legacy. People foolishly believed him when he said at a campaign stop in February 2008 that "ensuring the independence of our legal system from the executive and legislative branches or power" would be a key goal for his four- year mandate.
Failing Grade
Well, here is the test, and so far, neither Medvedev nor the Russian legal system is passing it. The atmosphere at the preliminary hearings held last week in the Khodorkovsky trial was a bad sign. The judge refused to let Khodorkovsky and his former associate Platon Lebedev out of their glass cages so they could sit next to their lawyers.
The person who has maintained his dignity is Khodorkovsky himself.
"I will not use any tricks, and will respond clearly to the accusation I face," he said in a statement. "I will not speak about this case being politically motivated so that you clearly understand that it is shockingly simple."
This puts him in line with dissidents like Andrei Sakharov and Natan Sharansky, who in the 1970s and 1980s challenged the Soviet Union to observe its own laws. Back then, that was enough to send them into exile.
What is at stake in the courtroom in Moscow is both Khodorkovsky's future and Medvedev's stature as an independent leader, capable of setting his own agenda and keeping his own goals.
Right now, given the rules of the game in Putin's Russia, both are set to lose.
(Celestine Bohlen is a Bloomberg News columnist. The opinions expressed are her own.)