Sobchak's Father, Anatoly, had been both Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev's law professor at Leningrad State University. He built a close relationship with Putin, in particular, and in 1991 Anatoly helped launch Putin's career in politics when he was the mayor of Saint Petersburg. Putin then helped Anatoly flee Russia when he was wanted on corruption charges. According to the Moscow News, "Putin's reported affection for the Sobchak family is widely believed to give Ksenia Sobchak a protected status, which may also explain her boldness", such as her encounter in October 2011 with Vasily Yakemenko, the controversial leader of the pro-Kremlin Nashi youth movement, when she reprimanded him for eating at an expensive restaurant in Moscow and published a video of the encounter on the internet.