Previously such application of lawyers of the Committee for Prevention of Torture to head of the Investigative Department of the Investigative Committee of the RF for the Nizhny Novgorod region Andrey Vinogradov brought no results – his subordinates from the Pavlovskiy Interdistrict Investigative Department simply ignored the orders of their superior and continue with red tape of the case of local entrepreneur Oleg Krayushkin’s tortures at the local police department.
It is worth noting that previously human rights defenders repeatedly complained about non-performance of the authorities of the Pavlovskiy Interdistrict Investigative Department of the Investigative Committee of the RF for the Nizhny Novgorod region, due to that the head of this department as well as the investigators have been already subjected to disciplinary action. However, this measure did not bring any result.
Continuing systematic non-performance of the investigator and the superiors of the Pavlovskiy Interdistrict Investigative Department of the Investigative Committee of the RF for the Nizhny Novgorod region forced lawyer of the Committee for Prevention of Torture Ilya Khorshev to once again apply to head of the regional Investigative Directorate Andrey Vinogradov.
In his response Vinogradov informed the human rights defender about the resumption of proceedings in the criminal case, and about subjecting the executives of the Pavlovskiy Interdistrict Investigative Department to disciplinary action for the violations that they committed. Head of the regional Investigative Department also pointed out that the «investigation of the criminal case is far from difficult».
Despite such a statement and the fact that this criminal investigation progress is monitored by the regional Investigative Directorate, the investigators of the Pavlovskiy Interdistrict Investigative Department have extended the monthly period of pre-trial investigation twice already without having conducted any investigative activities at all.
With regard to this today the lawyers of the Committee for Prevention of Torture applied to head of the Investigative Committee of Russia Aleksandr Bastrykin with a complaint about the systematic non-performance and procedural violations of the investigators and superiors of the Pavlovskiy Interdistrict Investigative Department.
In their complaint human rights defenders directed the attention of the head of the Investigative Committee to the facts of repeated issuing illegal procedural decisions in the framework of the criminal case, subjecting the executives to disciplinary action with regard to the violations committed in the course of the criminal investigation, and also asked to transfer the criminal case to the proceedings of the Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee of the RF for the Nizhny Novgorod region.
«One cannot but agree with the opinion of Mr Vinogradov that investigation of this criminal case is far from difficult. Oleg Krayushkin repeatedly identified his torturers in the course of investigative activities, however the investigators have not even bothered to perform a face-to-face confrontation yet. By the way, these employees still continue their service in law-enforcement bodies, – lawyer of the Committee for Prevention of Torture Ilya Khorshev emphasizes. – As for us we think that the problem is not in complexity of the criminal case itself, but in deliberate delaying the process of its investigation and lack of ability or intention to bring it to court by forces of the Interdistrict Investigative Department. That is why we insist on transferring this case to the regional Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee».
As we have previously reported, in September 2012 businessman from Pavlovo city Oleg Krayushkin applied to the INGO «Committee Against Torture» for legal assistance. According to Oleg, on 11 September 2012 he was subjected to torture by police officers in one of the rooms of the Pavlovskiy police department following numerous demands to confess to stealing a sawmill. The policemen forced the applicant to take off his boots and to kneel – and started hitting him with a rubber truncheon on his feet. The applicant also stated that one of the police officers occasionally hit him with his palms in the ears, face, and groin area. After about three hours of torture the officers, having failed to obtain a confession statement, took Oleg to a temporary detention facility of Sosnovskoye district police department and after a few days released him. A criminal case was initiated against the entrepreneur, however, it collapsed soon, and real culprits were brought to justice.
Despite the evidence of the elements of crime the investigator did not open the criminal case for a year, having issued eight unlawful refusals to initiate criminal proceedings. Only after the members of the Committee Against Torture organized a psychophysiological study on polygraph detector, which confirmed that Oleg’s words are true, as well as initiated the entrepreneur’s personal appointment with the head of the regional Investigative Committee Vladimir Stravinskas, a criminal case under item «а» part 3 Article 286 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation was initiated on 16 August 2013.
However, the victim himself as well as the human rights defenders was deeply concerned by the snail-paced progress of the investigation: initial investigative actions with Krayoushkin were performed only in April 2014. By the present time the case was suspended eight times already.
If previous refusals to initiate criminal proceedings were quashed by the Prosecutor’s Office and the Investigative Department superiors on their own, the last three times the investigation was resumed only after human rights defenders submitted the appropriate complaints.