The Investigative Committee investigator dismissed a criminal case with regard to the battery of defendant Vyacheslav Petrosyan by the police officers from the Krasnodar Territory, having deemed that he received his injuries on his own, during the fall from the police van. Lawyers with the Committee Against Torture, representing the interests of Petrosyan, will be insisting that this ruling is quashed and that the investigator is subjected to disciplinary action.
As we have previously reported, on 3 March 2020, Vyacheslav Petrosyan from Apsheronsk, the Krasnodar Territory, applied to the Committee Against Torture for legal assistance. He reported that he was a defendant in the criminal case which was being examined by the Apsheronsk District Court and was kept in custody. On 12 February, during the court hearing, as a mark of protest against the actions of the judge, who established that the court hearing should be conducted behind closed doors, he scratched his hands and neck with nail clippers. In response to such an action, he and two other convicts were delivered from the court building to the local temporary detention facility.
According to Petrosyan, in the inner court of the police building next to the entry to the Temporary Detention Facility, the convoy officers brought him on the ground and started to beat him up with arms and feet: “When I got out of the car, they hit me at my right side, that made me fall. They removed handcuffs from me and put them again after pulling my arms behind my back, and fastened my feet with a scotch tape. After that they started to strangle me and kicked me in the right eye. There were blows at my right side. Someone shouted: “enough”, the other one responded – “he’s got a lot of health”.
According to Vyacheslav, apart from kicks and blows, an electric shocker was also applied on various parts of his body.
After that, according to Petrosyan, he was taken to the investigative department of Krasnodar where he was not accepted twice due to presence of injuries, and accepted him only after he was provided with medical assistance in various medical institutions of Krasnodar.
According to the available medical documentation, on 12 February, Vyacheslav Petrosyan was diagnosed with the following bodily injuries: “Bruises of the soft tissues of the head. Paraorbital hematoma on the left. Mild contusion of the left eye. Contusion of the left knee joint”.
On 18 February, during the visit of members of the Public Monitoring Commission for the Krasnodar Territory of Mr Petrosyan at the Temporary Detention Facility, various bodily injuries were also registered on him, with regard to that the public observers applied to the Investigative Committee with a crime report.
On 2 November 2020, Senior Investigator with the Belorechensky Interdistrict Investigative Department of the Investigative Committee of the RF for the Krasnodar Territory Oleg Murtazov initiated criminal proceedings against unidentified police officers with the Department of the Ministry of the Interior of Russia for the Apsheronsky District with regard to the elements of crime under item “a” Article 286 of the Criminal Code of the RF (“abuse of office using violence”).
Before that the investigators issued seven rulings dismissing the claim to open a criminal case, which were subsequently quashed as illegal.
On 26 February 2021, investigator Dmitry Mikhailyuta dismissed a criminal case with regard to inflicting bodily injuries to Vyacheslav Petrosyan by the police officers due to absence of the criminal event.
Today, lawyers with the Committee Against Torture received a copy of this ruling.
“Investigator Mikhailyuta came to a conclusion that Petrosyan received his injuries on his own, during the fall from the police van, but this conclusion is based only on the evidence obtained from the police officers whom Vyacheslav accuses of the battery, – lawyer with the Committee Against Torture Roman Veretennikov comments. – We think that the dismissal of the criminal case is illegal: despite the fact that the investigator planned to assign an additional medical forensic examination, he never did it; in addition, a number of investigative activities aiming at establishing all the circumstances of the event was not carried out. We shall be insisting that the dismissal of the criminal case is quashed and that the investigator is subjected to disciplinary action”.