Deputy Interdistrict Prosecutor of Tuapse Sergey Ulchich returned the illegally dismissed case on tortures at the local police department to the investigative department. The Prosecutor’s Office representative pointed out that investigator Philipp Shevrikuko did not perform, as least, thirteen necessary investigative activities and illegally dismissed the criminal case. Now it is assigned to a new investigator, and the lawyers with the Committee Against Torture will be insisting on subjecting Mr Shevrikuko to disciplinary action.
As we have previously reported, in November 2018, Evgeny Bounin from Indyuk settlement of the Tuapse region applied to the Committee Against Torture for legal assistance. He told that on 12 November he was summoned for a conversation at the police department, located on Mira Street in Tuapse: there, in one of the offices of the criminal investigations department, one of the officers handcuffed him and demanded that he wrote a full confession of a phone theft.
“I said I was not involved in this. After that the police officer started to hit me on the head with first and palms of his hands. The pulled the hood of my coat on my head and after several blows my nose started to bleed and there appeared a pool of blood on the floor”, – Bounin recalls.
According to Evgeniy, the police officer, who strongly smelled of alcohol, threatened him that the battery would last for the whole night and as a result he would still be apprehended as a suspect.
“Having concerns for my health, I wrote the required confession at the dictation of another criminal investigations officer”, – Bounin continues.
According to Evgeniy, at the police department he was offered some vodka, after that the police officers brought him home in their vehicle, and on the road he continued to drink vodka with the police officer who had beaten him up.
In the morning of the next day, Bounin called an ambulance team to his house, and was put to Tuapse District Hospital No.1. There Evgeniy was diagnosed with: “Closed craniocerebral injury, brain concussion, extravasation of soft tissues of the right periorbital area, contusion of soft tissues of the occipital region”.
On the same day, 13 November, Evgeniy’s sister applied to the Investigative Committee with a crime report. According to Bounin, a forensic scientist came to his hospital immediately; he photographed and registered his bodily injuries.
Senior investigator of the Investigative Department for Tuapse city of the Investigative Department of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation for the Krasnodar Territory Philipp Shevrikuko was assigned to perform checking of this crime report.
“Instead of timely check of circumstances described in the complaint, questioning Bounin, witnesses, performing prompt search and record of data crucial for establishing the truth, investigator Shevrikuko twice tried to hand this complaint over to investigators on major cases investigation of the territorial investigative department, but each time he received a refusal with a wording that the “mentioned events are not specifically complicated and do not attract much public interest”, as well as committed on the territory of one region”, – lawyer with the Committee Against Torture Sergey Romanov comments. – After that, Mr Shevrikuko himself had to perform the check of complaint about tortures at the police department”.
On 10 April 2019, the investigator issued a ruling refusing to initiate criminal proceedings. In this ruling, Mr Shevrikuko openly admitted that “the performed check failed to fully prove or disprove the circumstances of how E.A.Bounin wrote his confession”, with regard to which the investigator ordered to conduct a number of expert examinations, the results of these were not ready at that time.
However, a few days later, on 16 April 2019, investigator Shevrikuko initiated criminal proceedings under items “a”, “b” of Part 3 of Article 286 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (“abuse of office using violence and special equipment”).
During the time of the investigation the criminal case was illegally dismissed twice, last time – on 27 October. Having dismissed the criminal case, investigator Shevrikuko every time came to a conclusion that no one beat up Bounin at the police department.
However, this ruling of investigator Shevrikuko was quashed on 22 November 2019 by Deputy Interdistrict Prosecutor of Tuapse Sergey Ulchich as illegal, the case was returned to the investigative department in order for resuming the investigation.
Today, lawyers with the Committee Against Torture received a notification that the period of preliminary investigation for this criminal case is extended till 29 December 2019. This case will be investigated by new investigator Svetlana Dyadyushka.
“In his ruling, the Prosecutor’s Office representative Sergey Ulchich points to the fact that investigator Shevrikuko did not fulfill, at least, thirteen investigative actions, however, it did not prevent him from illegally dismissing the criminal case, – lawyer with the Committee Against Torture Roman Veretennikov comments.
– We are, definitely, satisfied that the investigation is resumed and a new investigator will be working on the case, we will also insist that investigator Shevrikuko is subjected to disciplinary action and that Evgeny Bounin is paid a compensation for moral damage inflicted by ineffective investigation of his torture complaint”.