Head of City Department of Interior of Orenburg Aleksandr Nyrov offered official apologies to Vyacheslav Sadovsky, Anton Ferapontov and Maksim Nimatov, who suffered from illegal actions of the police officers. The apologies were offered to the victims only three months after the verdict of conviction with regard to the police officers entered into legal force and after lawyers with the Committee Against Torture applied to superiors of the Orenburg penal colony with demand of appropriate redress.

(Aleksandr Nyrov, photo: http://www.time56.info)

As we have previously reported, on 27 August 2008 eighteen-year old Vyacheslav Sadovskiy and Anton Ferapontov, as well as nineteen-year old Maksim Nimatov applied to the Orenburg office of the Committee Against Torture. They reported to human rights defenders that on 25 August 2008 they were detained by the police, taken to the Dzerzhinskiy District Department of Internal Affairs where they were battered and brutally tortured. For the whole night police officers were trying to obtain confession statements from them related to a number of different crimes: from the robbery of the beer stand to murder of the police officer. According to the applicants, in addition to «standard» battery the police put gas masks on their heads and blew cigarette smoke into the tube, hung them by the hands and legs tied behind their backs, everything was accompanied by battery with truncheons.
 
The victims state that the tortures lasted till the morning of August 26. The detainees were deprived of sleep and if they started falling asleep they were hit on the head.

The victims’ parents and other relatives, having accidentally learned that their sons are detained by the police, kept the watch near the building of the Dzerzhinsky District Police Department. It is worth pointing out the fact that for a long time the police tried to convince them that their sons were not in the building of the District Police Department. In the evening the police allowed the lawyers to see the young men. Despite the fact that the police officers threatened them with harsher treatment in case they change their testimony, the young men in the presence of the lawyers reported that they were forced to incriminate themselves under torture and to sign some procedural documents required for the authorities’ representatives.

The police officers illegally detained the young men for over 24 hours without making any charges. After the young men were released they first went to the first-aid station, and then to hospital, where the doctors registered all numerous bodily injuries: all the three were diagnosed with hematomas, bruises, joints dislocations, one of them was diagnosed with cerebral concussion, Vyacheslav Sadovsky had a broken rib, and Anton Ferapontov had a broken nose.

On the next day all the three young men and their parents applied to the investigative authorities with a crime report. The victims also applied to the Committee Against Torture for legal help.

The verdict, which was passed in 2018 with regard to police officers Albert Akmanov and Vasily Zubikhin, became a disappointing result of years-long struggle for restoration of violated rights of the three young men. The defendants were declared guilty only of illegal apprehension of the young men and their detention at the District Department of the Interior. The judge sentenced Akmanov and Zubikhin to eleven months of prison term each to be served in the colony-settlement, however, due to the expiry of the period for bringing to criminal responsibility, the court released them from punishment.

Human rights defenders are now appealing against this ruling at the court of cassation.

After the verdict of conviction with regard to the police officers entered into legal force, lawyers with the Committee Against Torture applied to the Department of the Ministry of the Interior of the Russian Federation for the Orenburg region, demanding to offer apologies to the victims who suffered from illegal actions of the police officers.

Today, human rights defenders received a copy of answer from Head of the Department of the Ministry of Interior of the Russian Federation “Orenburgskoe” Aleksandr Nyrov, in which he offers official apologies to Vyacheslav Sadovsky, Anton Ferapontov and Maksim Nimatov.

“After ten years after his subordinates committed a crime the head of the City Department of the Interior of Orenburg offered official apologies to the victims. Unfortunately, once again, the representatives of the Ministry of the Interior in the Orenburg region offered their apologies to the victims not at their own initiative and in a timely manner, as it is stipulated by the law, but only after demands from human rights defenders”, – lawyer with the Committee Against Tortire Denis Iskhakov emphasizes.

As we have reported earlier, previously, the Orenburg Regional Court awarded Vyacheslav Sadovsky, Anton Ferapontov and Maksim Nimatov two hundred thousand rubles each as a compensation for moral damage for violation of reasonable time limit for criminal proceedings.
 
For the crimes committed against Anton Ferapontov and Vyacheslav Sadovsky, the courts passed a ruling to collect thirty and ten thousand rubles from the Ministry of the Interior of Russia, accordingly. These rulings will be, definitely, appealed against by human rights defenders up to the European Court of Human Rights.

At the present time, a lawsuit is submitted to the Leninsky District Court of Orenburg in the interests of Maksim Nimatov on compensation for moral damage, inflicted by the crime.