Yesterday, on 16 January 2018, the Judicial Board for Civil Cases of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Mari El passed a ruling on collecting twenty thousand roubles from the Ministry of the Interior of Russia as a compensation of moral damage inflicted to Valentin Aleksandrov who was beaten up by the police officers in 2012. Human rights defenders intend to appeal against this ruling in the part of the awarded compensation.
(Valentin Aleksandrov, photo: Dmitry Lyubimov /7х7)
As we have already reported, on 26 February 2013 a citizen of Morki settlement Valentin Aleksandrov applied to the office of INGO «The Committee Against Torture» in Mari El Republic; he claimed that the officers of State Traffic Safety Inspectorate (STSI) had beat him during the arrest and had broken his arm.
According to Valentin, on 17 September 2012 he should have gone to a business trip to Arzamas (Nizhny Novgorod region) to take part in a professional competition for the title «The best fire engine driver». That day early in the morning Valentin left home and drove his own car to his place of work in order to take his fire engine license. However, when he drove past the “Liliya” trading center an officer of DMVTC demanded stopping. Having recollected that he had left his driver license at home Valentin chose a wrong way of saving the situation – he didn’t stop and drove home to get the documents.
Valentin drove into his yard and went for the documents when the police UAZ car came, two officers jumped out and caught up with the forgetful driver at the inner porch.
According to Valentin, one of the policemen grabbed his right arm and the other hit him in the face. The further beating continued along with swearing when Valentin fall down. As a final humiliation act they twisted his arms by force, put handcuffs on and then were careful to take him to the Central Regional Hospital of Morki.
There a duty doctor wrote a medical examination act, where he stated that Valentin was sober. Next day on the basis of the primary examination forensic medical experts established that Valentin had a closed fracture of the left part of the left ulnar bone with a slight fraction (which is an injury of moderate severity), also bruises on the elbow joints, shoulders, chest, abrasions on the shins, the right forearm and the elbow joints.
A check was carried out by the senior investigator of the Inquiry Department of Committee of Inquiry in Mari El Republic V.V. Petukhov based on the fact of violence used by the officers of the Road Patrol Service; according to the results of this check he issued four unlawful denials to initiate criminal proceedings. All the unlawful decisions of the investigator were appealed against by lawyers of the Committee Against Torture, who represent the interests of Valentin Aleksandrov.
It is worth pointing out that during the appeal against the last refusal the Prosecutor of Mari El Republic Sergey Ryumshin reacted to the application of lawyer of the Committee for the Prevention of Torture Dmitry Yalikov and submitted a demand to the Head of the Investigative Department of the Investigative Committee for Mari El Republic on initiating criminal proceedings.
As a result, on 11 November 2014 the Zvenigovsky Interdistrict Investigative Department of the Investigative Committee for Mari El initiated a criminal case based on elements of crime under item “a” Part 3 Article 286 of the RF Criminal Code (“abuse of office using violence”).
The investigation of this criminal case disappointingly resulted in three illegal rulings on its dismissal, issued by Senior Investigator Oksana Romanovskaya. Time after time the human rights defenders submitted complaints on these refusals to the Prosecutor’s Office.
After examination of the materials of the criminal case dismissed by investigator Romanovskaya on 11 February 2016, the Prosecutor of the Morkinsky District of Mari El Nadezhda Opikova declared this dismissal to be illegal and submitted a demand to the Head of the Zvenigovsky Investigative Department, in which she pointed out that in the course of the investigation of the criminal case a grave red tape was allowed to take place, which led to violation of Valentin Aleksandrov’s constitutional rights. What is more, in the Prosecutor’s opinion, the evidence obtained during the investigation of the criminal case, gives enough grounds to bring charges against one of the police officers under item “a” Part 3 Article 286 of the RF Criminal Code.
As a result, in August 2016 investigator Oksana Romanovskaya brought charges against the traffic control police officer with regard to committing a crime under item “a” Part 3 Article 286 of the RF Criminal Code. After the indictment was endorsed with regard to this criminal case, it was sent to court for examination on the merits.
In the course of court discussions State Prosecutor Nadezhda Opikova asked the court to declare Evgeny Petukhov guilty of the charged crime, but asked for a punishment, not involving the real jail time – three years of conditional sentence. Also, Mrs Opikova dismissed the charges in the part of the fracture of the victim’s arm – according to the State Prosecutor’s opinion, in the course of the judicial investigation it was not proved that this injury was inflicted as a result of the former STSI officer actions.
On 3 April 2017 judge of the Morkinsky District Court of the Republic of Mari El Lidiya Ivanova passed a ruling with regard to former STSI officer Evgeny Petukhov. She was declared guilty of committing a crime under item “a” of Part 3 of Article 286 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (“abuse of office using violence”) and was sentenced to three years conditional term.
After the verdict entered into legal force, Valentin Aleksandrov filed a suit to the Morkinsky District Court on collecting a million roubles from the Ministry of the Interior of the Russian Federation as a compensation for moral damage, inflicted by the crime of the police officer. However, the District Court dismissed the lawsuit, having decided that it was the Ministry of Finance of Russia that should be the defendant.
This ruling of the Morkinsky District Court was appealed in the Supreme Court of the Republic of Mari
Yesterday, the Judicial Board of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Mari El declared the ruling of the court of the first instance to be illegal and passed a ruling on collecting twenty thousand roubles from the Ministry of the Interior of Russia as a compensation of moral damage inflicted to Valentin Aleksandrov.
According to human rights defender Dmitry Yalikov, representing the interests of Valentin Aleksandrov, this court ruling will be appealed at the court of cassation in the part of the amount of the awarded compensation.