Tree years after the “mopping-up” carried out by special police forces there is again a chance to punish the police officers who are to blame for the massive battery in Ivanovskaya. 

The court satisfied the claim of lawyers from the Committee against Torture who represent the interests of Ivanovskaya citizens.

Today the Committee against Torture received the cassation decision of the criminal division of the Stavropolskiy regional court canceling the judgment of the Oktyabrskiy district court of Stavropol dated 12 October 2006.  At that time the curt agreed with the Prosecutor’s office that had suspended the investigation into the events in Ivanovskaya. Today the regional court cancelled this judgment and submitted the case file for another consideration to the Oktyabrskiy district court.

The cassation instance agreed with the Committee lawyers who asked to cancel the district court verdict as unlawful. According to the Committee against Torture, the Prosecutor’s office wanted to stop investigating the notorious case and issued a ruling to suspend it untimely, without performing the legal procedure to identify the perpetrators.  

You may remember that the tragic events in Ivanovskaya invstigated by the Committee against Torture happened in June 2005. According to the findings of the mobile task force (MTF) consisting of Russian human rights defenders, the local SPF staff (Stavropolskiy Kray Department of Internal Affairs) savagely battered several minors during a regular “mopping-up”.  

It is worth mentioning that when the job was done in Stavropolskiy Kray, the MTF and the Public Verdict Foundation – human rights organizations partner- provided a lawyer for the victims and ensured prompt legal assistance.