The court declared applying physical force against a participant of a protest rally in Orenburg to be illegal

News

03 September 2021

The Leninsky District Court of Orenburg declared the actions of unidentified police
officers who brutally detained Dmitry Teleshenko during a protest rally on 31 January
2021 to be illegal.


Dmitry Teleshenko applied to the Committee Against Torture together with other
Orenburg citizens who suffered from the police officers’ actions during the January
protest rallies.

“Some people in civilian clothes seized both my hands at the same time. These men did
not introduce themselves and did not said a word to me, but seized me by my hands
and feet and simply carried me”, — the young man recalls. Dmitry was transported in
this condition to a police van. On the way, the officers in civilian clothes rammed the
back of some person with Teleshenko’s head. According to the applicant, his arms went
numb and he asked to be released and promised he would go to the van himself. In
response to this, one of the officers hit Dmitry’s right cheekbone: “This blow made me
feel pain and humiliation”.

After apprehension, Teleshenko was taken to Police Department No.1 of Orenburg,
where protocols on administrative violations under Part 1 of Article 19.3 of the
Administrative Offences Code of the Russian Federation (“failure to obey the legal
demand of a police officer”) and Part 5 of Article 20.2 of the Administrative Offences
Code of the Russian Federation (“violation of the established procedure of a gathering,
rally, demonstration, march or a picket”) were drawn up. Dmitry was detained and put to
the special detention room, where he spent 48 hours.

The applicants who applied to the Committee Against Torture after the described
events, told about the violations of the detention conditions in the police department:
they were put in the cell for administratively detained for no reason, no parcels with food
from relatives and friends were permitted, no lawyers were allowed.

Lawyers with the Committee Against Torture applied to the Investigative Committee with
a crime report. The investigator of the Investigative Department for the Southern
Administrative District of Orenburg with the Investigative Committee of the RF for the
Orenburg region Danil Dmitriyev four times dismissed the claim to open a criminal case
with regard to the Teleshenko’s complaint. After that, human rights defenders applied to

court with a lawsuit where they asked to declare the police actions related to applying
physical force against Teleshenko during apprehension, bringing him to the police
department, taking him to the cell for administratively detained, taking him to the special
detention room and keeping him there to be illegal.

On 11 August, judge of the Leninsky District Court of Orenburg Oksana Pimenova
partially satisfied the human rights defenders lawsuit and declared “the actions of the
officers of the Department of the Interior of Russia for the Orenburg region related to
applying physical force during delivery of Dmitry Teleshenko to a police van on 31
January 2021” to be illegal. The court dismissed the rest of the lawsuit.

The court ruling is dubious: on the one hand, we are satisfied with the fact that the
court declared allying of physical force against Dmitry Teleshenko by the police officers
to be illegal, on the other hand, this ruling causes bewilderment, since despite the fact
that the violations committed by the police officers are obvious, the court refuses to
declare their actions to be illegal. In this part we will challenge the court ruling on
appeal
, — lawyer with the Committee Against Torture Albina Mudarisova comments.
— In addition, we intend to insist that the criminal case is opened with regard to the
crime report submitted by Dmitry Teleshenko concerning the abuse of office by the
police officers during his apprehension
”.

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