Vladimir Klopov from Orsk accuses the police officers from the Counter-Extremism Center that they beat him up, forcing him to confess of distributing extremist materials on the Internet. Lawyers with the Committee Against Torture already applied with a crime report to the Investigative Committee, and also started their own public investigation.
(Vladimir Klopov)
On 28 September of this year Vladimir Klopov from Orsk of the Orenburg region applied to the Committee Against Torture for legal help. In his explanation to human rights defenders he reported that on 24 September he was attacked by two men in civilian clothes near his house door, they shouted “Freeze! Police!”.
Vladimir claims that the police officers, without any explanations, brought him down on the porch and hit his head and body several times with knees, after that they brought him in the car and delivered him to the building where the Interdistrict Department of the Counter-Extremism Center of the Department of the Ministry of the Interior of Russia for the Orenburg region is located.
According to Klopov, at the Center “E” the police officers demanded that he confessed of distributing extremist materials in social networks: “I told them that, firstly, I did not distribute anything like that, and secondly, I deleted all my accounts in social networks over a year ago. Then the police officers started to tell me that I was “living improperly”… I don’t know why they think that, probably, because of my active public stance. During this preachment one of the police officers was hitting my neck and head with a sharp of his hand”.
According to Vladimir, after the battery ceased, the Investigative Committee representative entered the room: “He suggested that I signed some documents, based on which it is concluded that I was publishing extremist materials on the Internet from 2011 to 2014. At the same time, the investigator was convincing me that if I sign these papers, it will allow dismissing the investigative check in relation to me. I did not sign anything, which was registered by the attesting witnesses, but informed this investigator that the police officers applied illegal physical violence against me”.
After that, as Vladimir recalls, the same police officers who were apprehending him and beating him up, brought him to the morque of the city hospital No.3: “The was a man there dressed like a doctor. He did not introduce himself. At that time the police officers were in the room with me. The doctor asked me what ailed me, and recorded all my data. I think he was aware why I was taken to him. I showed a bruise on the left hand elbow and also said that the index finger of my left hand felt numb. The doctor put down all I said, measured the bruise on my right hand with a ruler, and made some notes. After that one of the police officers told me I was free to go. I went out of the room, and the police officers stayed with the doctor”.
In the evening of the same day, Vladimir Klopov applied for medical assistance to the first aid station of City Hospital No.2. The doctors diagnosed him with the following bodily injuries: “Contusions, bruises of upper limbs and head”.
On 5 October, lawyers with the Committee Against Torture submitted a crime report in the interests of Vladimir Klopov to the Investigative Department for Orsk of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation for the Orenburg region.
“We initiated our own public investigation, in the framework of which we already questioned several people, who confirmed that before Vladimir’s contact with police officers, he did not have any bodily injuries and health complaints, – lawyer with the Committee Against Torture Denis Iskhakov says. – We also intend to file a number of motions to the investigator on conducting specific checking activities necessary for establishing the full picture of what happened and passing a lawful ruling”.