Despite the fact that the investigator failed either to explain how Aleksey Shlyapugin from Nizhny Novgorod region got a rib fracture, or eliminate numerous contradictions in medical documents and witnesses’ evidence, the regional Investigative Department refused to resume the check of the complaint against the battery by the police officers. Lawyers with the Committee Against Torture will be appealing against this ruling.
As we have previously reported, Aleksey Shlyapugin from Pervoye Maya settlement of the Balakhninsky District of the Nizhny Novgorod region applied to human rights defenders for legal assistance. In his explanation to human rights defenders Aleksey reported that on 26 June 2017 about midday he came at his garage, where his fellow was, who was using this room for computer equipment repair. According to Shlyapugin, he was about to unload his tools in the garage and to go out to run errands, however, at this moment four men in civilian clothes attacked him.
– They brought me down on the floor in the garage shouting: “Lie down! Where are the drugs?” When they were bringing me down, one of the men hit and kicked me several times with hands against the body and my feet. There were no less than 20 blows, as I remember, and the battery lasted about two minutes, – Aleksey remembers.
According to Aleksey, after the battery ended, the police officers demanded that he confessed of manufacturing and sales of drugs, searched the garage and the car belonging to Shlyapugin, after that they delivered him to the Balakhninsky Police Department.
According to Shlyapugin, at the police department the police officers demanded that he confessed of manufacturing and selling drugs, but he refused to do it. After that he was given some documents to sign, out of which Shlyapugin filled only the report on administrative violation, where he put down a comment that he did not agree to it. Aleksey felt bad due to pain around ribs and asked the police officers to call the doctor; however, no-one reacted to his pleas. Then Shlyapugin was sent to a one-man cell, where he was kept till the morning.
On the next day, the justice of the peace convicted Aleksey to five days of arrest for his refusal to undergo medical examination. As Aleksey points out, the police officers started to insist on medical examination at the very time when the search was being conducted in his car and garage. Feeling concern that if he went for examination, the search would be conducted without his participation, Shlyapugin refused to undergo it until the investigative activity is not complete, and asked to do it later. However, the court sided with the police officers, and the citizen of Pervoye Maya settlement was placed in the detention room in the Pravdinsk microdistrict.
After Aleksey left the detention room, he applied for medical assistance at the first-aid station of the Sormovsky District of Nizhny Novgorod. The doctors diagnosed him with the following bodily injuries: bruises, contusions on the body and thighs. Considering that the pain in the ribs area lingered, on 5 July Aleksey turned for medical assistance to the first-aid station of the Leninsky District of Nizhny Novgorod, where the doctors registered the fracture of the eighth rib from the left.
On 10 July Aleksey submitted a crime report to the Balakhninsky Interdistrict Investigative Department of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation for the Nizhny Novgorod region, where he described all the circumstances of what happened to him. On 9 August investigator of this department Evgeniya Murzayeva issued a refusal to initiate criminal proceedings.
Totally during the period of pre-investigative check, investigator Murzayeva passed six “refusals”, five of which were subsequently quashed as illegal.
On 28 September 2018, lawyer with the Committee Against Torture Anastasia Nikitina appealed against the last “refusal” during the personal appointment with the head of the Department of Procedural Control of the Investigative Department of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation for the Nizhny Novgorod region Aleksey Peresypin.
“In the complaint we indicated that investigator Murzayeva performed the check in the formal way, having failed to perform numerous checking activities aimed at elimination of contradictions and establishing all the circumstances of the events”,– Anastasia Nikitina comments.
Yesterday, human rights defenders received a letter from the regional Investigative Department of the Investigative Committee, in which Mr Peresypin informed that the ruling of investigator Murzayeva is justified and legal and there are no grounds for quashing it. At the same time, as the Investigative Committee representative pointed out, investigator Evgeniya Murzayeva and her superior Igor Koshelev are brought to responsibility for violations committed in their work.
“We do not agree with the stance of Mr Peresypin and will be appealing against his reply to head of the regional Investigative Department Andrey Vinogradov, – Anastasia Nikitina emphasizes. – In the course of the check investigator Murzayeva failed to answer the question who and how broke Aleksey Shlyapugin’s rib, failed to question a lot of witnesses who saw bodily injuries on our applicant. She also failed to eliminate the existing contradictions in the medical documentation and evidence of the participants of the incident. We cannot consider such a work of the investigator to be effective and will insist on thorough and full-fledged investigation”.