The human rights NGO “Public Verdict Foundation” is six years old. The Public Verdict Foundation established in 2004 operates in the majority of Russian regions. We are still focused on providing legal, information and psychological support to victims of police abuse. We have granted assistance to a variety of people living in different parts of our country: from Pskov region to Kaliningrad region, from Primorye and Kamchatka in the east to Astrakhan region in the north and Chechnya and Dagestan in the south. The Public Verdict Foundation has dealt with 341 case of police abuse in respect of Russian citizens. As a result of our work, 95 law enforcement agents have been held criminally liable, 59 have been sentenced to real imprisonment, for 34 people more the sentence has been suspended, 2 agents have been fined. We do not only aim at prosecuting the perpetrators in charge of police abuse, we also try to help our applicants to obtain compensations of moral damage incurred by unlawful actions of state agents from the agents themselves and the RF Finance Ministry. Within 6 years, 11 million rubles have been awarded to police abuse victims with the assistance of the Public Verdict Foundation and its regional partners.
Besides helping individuals directly, the Foundation also provides expert and analysis services and closely cooperates with regional and Moscow NGOs, law enforcement agencies of the country. The Public Verdict Foundation has participated in developing suggestions for the police reform and the NGO strategy targeted at ensuring full execution of the ECtHR judgments delivered against Russia. It informs the population about the facts of police abuse and possibilities to defend one’s rights.
Natalia Taubina, director of the Foundation: “From the moment of its creation the foundation has proceeded from the principle that in order to achieve a sustainable result in redressing victims’ rights, it is necessary to promote structural changes dramatically transforming the way the law enforcement system works and to ensure better human rights observance by people employed in this system. These two lines – helping police abuse victims and promotion of the police reform – are the priorities of the Foundation determining its major activities. ”
The Interregional Committee against Torture congratulates its colleagues and wishes them Happy Birthday! We wish our partners from the Public Verdict Foundation success in human rights protection, happiness and new victories.