I will discuss the under-theorized role that the erosion of the rule of law has played in the attempted consolidation of Russian democracy and re-establishment of authoritarianism. As a means of periodization and development of analytical concepts, I will discuss three public legal filings that I have made: (1) a 2011 report on the second conviction of Mikhail Khodorkovsky requested by the Presidential Council of the Russian Federation for Civil Society and Human Rights; (2) a 2020 third-party intervention before the European Court of Human Rights in the case of Navalnyy & Ofitserov v. Russia; and (3) a 2023 amicus curiae brief to the Russian Constitutional Court concerning Article 20.3.3 of the Russian Federation Code of Administrative Offenses.