Today, 13 February 2018, the Nizhny Novgorod Regional Court upheld the ruling of the court of the first instance, which awarded thirty thousand rubles to Denis Kramchaninov as a compensation for moral damage inflicted by the red tape of the Shakhunksy Interdistrict Investigative Department, – during the period of seven years the investigators ten times illegally refused to open a criminal case based on Kramchaninov’s complaint about torture. Lawyers with the Committee Against Torture intend to appeal against the ruling of the regional court in the part of the amount of the awarded compensation under the cassational procedure.
(Photo: Denis Kramchaninov)
As we have previously reported, Denis Kramchaninov applied to the Committee Against Torture in July 2010. He told the human rights defenders that he was severely beaten by a local police officer who was forcing the young man to sign a false self-accusation of committing a theft.
As Kramchaninov reported in his explanation, in the evening of 15 July 2010 he was brought from his home to the Shakhunsky Police Department. Inside the office premises the police officer demanded that the guy confessed of theft, after that he hit him several times with his fists against the head, pressed his fingers with pliers, and, having put the gas mask on the young man, made him do knee bends. The battery and torture lasted about two hours, after that Denis yielded and agreed to sign a full confession, which was dictated to him by the police officer. When in the evening of the same day the young man applied to the Shakhunskaya District hospital doctors diagnosed him with a cerebral concussion and registered some hematomas on his body.
The criminal case on theft initiated against Denis was dismissed in a short time due to failure to prove the young man’s guilt.
For almost seven years human rights defenders were insisting on opening the criminal case based on Denis torture report: during this time ten refusals to initiate criminal proceedings were issued, subsequently they were declared illegal and quashed. In August 2016, lawyers with the Committee Against Torture applied to the European Court of Human Rights with a complaint in the interests of Denis Kramchaninov.
On 29 May 2017, the criminal case was opened with regard to former investigative officer of the Department of the Interior for the Shakhunsky District Andrey Tumanov, who is accused of committing a crime under item “a” part 3 Article 286 of the Criminal Code of the RF (“abuse of office with the use of violence”).
The preliminary investigation of the criminal case took about two months and after the assertion of the indictment by the Prosecutor it was sent to court for evaluation on its merits.
On 17 January of this year, judge of the Shakhunsky District Court of the Nizhny Novgorod region Valentina Smelova passed a judgment of conviction with regard to former investigative officer of the Department of the Interior for the Shakhunsky District Andrey Tumanov, who was declared guilty of committing a crime under item “a” part 3 Article 286 of the Criminal Code of the RF (“abuse of office with the use of violence”) and sentenced to four years’ conditional term.
On 30 January, the verdict took its legal effect since neither of the parties appealed against it.
As we have previously reported, in November 2016, human rights defenders applied to court on behalf of Kramchaninov with a lawsuit on compensation of the moral damage, incurred to him by inefficient work of the investigators. On 16 August of last year, the Nizhny Novgorod District Court partially satisfied the claims under the lawsuit, having awarded thirty thousand rubles to Kramchaninov as a compensation out of the claimed three hundred thousand.
Today the Nizhny Novgorod Regional Court refused to satisfy the appellate appeal of the defendant and plaintiff, upholding the ruling of the court of the first instance.
“We certainly are not satisfied with the result of the today’s court hearing and intend to appeal against the ruling of the regional court in the part of the amount of the awarded compensation under cassational procedure, – lawyer with the Committee Against Torture Sergey Babinets, representing Denis Kramchaninov’s interests, comments. – The awarded sum does not correspond to the practice of the European Court of Human Rights, and, essentially, leaves the seven-years-long investigators’ red tape unpunished”.