The Prosecutor’s Office of Sovetsky District of Nizhny Novgorod has quashed the refusal to initiate the criminal proceedings in relation to the police officers who performed a house-check in the house of the mother of Tatyana Sheronova in April 2015. According to the pensioner, during the house check the police officers used physical force against her, as well as special equipment. Quashing the refusal became possible only in court, where the lawyers of the Committee for Prevention of Torture, representing Sheronova’s interests, applied with a complaint.
(Photo: Tatyana Sheronova)
On 22 April 2015 Tatyana Sheronova from Nizhny Novgorod applied to human rights defenders for legal assistance. According to the applicant, on 17 April the police officers came to her paralyzed mother. They demanded to let them into the living quarters in order to perform the house-check. Tatyana told the police officers that she was not registered at this address, but was looking after her elderly mother, that is why she refused to let the visitors in. At the same time Sheronova demanded to call for her lawyer as well as the precinct police officer, so that they could monitor the legality of the house-check.
As it was explained by the applicant, the police officers nevertheless forced themselves into the household, after that they hit her several times, wound her hands behind her back and handcuffed her. Feeling bad, Tatyana asked to call for an ambulance. The arrived medical team rendered necessary medical assistance to her, however, the police officers refused to uncuff her so the medics had to measure her blood pressure in this position. According to Sheronova, she spent about four hours handcuffed during the house-check.
After Tatyana was taken to the Sovetsky District police department she became ill, and the arrived medics hospitalized her to the municipal hospital No.39 with a diagnosis «hypertensic crisis». On 22 April Tatyana also applied to the bureau of forensic medical examination, where numerous bruises were registered on her.
A day before, on 21 April, Tatyana Sheronova applied with a complaint against the police officers’ actions to the Prosecutor’s Office of the Sovetsky District of Nizhny Novgorod. This complaint was sent to the Investigative Department for the Sovetsky District of Nizhny Novgorod of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation for the Nihzny Novgorod region, investigator Artem Volkov, who on 22 May issued a refusal to initiate criminal proceedings against the police officers. This “refusal” was quashed by the superior authority as illegal, and the material of the check was sent for additional check.
On 24 June investigator Volkov, having failed to detect the element of crime in the actions of the police officers during the house-check, issued another refusal to initiate criminal proceedings.
«We appealed against this «refusal» to the head of the Investigative Department for the Sovetsky District, who dismissed our complaint. Then we applied with a similar complaint to the Prosecutor’s Office, where it was also dismissed, – lawyer of INGO «The Committee for Prevention of Torture» Sergey Romanov, representing the interests of Tatyana Sheronova, commented. – After two refusals we had to apply to court with a complaint, where we indicated a number of drawbacks, which occurred during the check based on Tatyana’s application. It is worth noting that during the examining of our complaint in the court the Prosecutor’s Office representative at first asked the court to dismiss it, however, during the yesterday’s court hearing, unexpectedly for us, a Prosecutor’s Office ruling was delivered to us (dated two days before) on quashing the ruling under appeal and sending the materials for additional check to the Investigative Committee. Despite such a variability of the regulatory authority position in this case, let us hope that the investigative authorities will perform all the checking activities for establishing all the circumstances of the incident, and the Prosecutor’s Office will thoroughly check the legality of the awarded judgment».