The Khasavyurt District Court of the Republic of Dagestan changed the measure of restraint of two police officers accused of applying tortures to force a local citizen to confess of a rape of an underage neighbor girl. The court put Deputy Head of Criminal Investigations of the Department of the Interior of Russia for the Khasavyurt District Ramazan Suleymanov and criminal investigations officer Yusoup Magomedov under house arrest till 10 January 2020. Before that, for a month they were under custody at the Pre-Trial Detention Facility.
As we have previously reported, a citizen of Mutsalaul settlement of the Republic of Dagestan Musa Aliyev applied for legal assistance to the Committee Against Torture on 25 October of this year. He told human rights defenders that on 6 September the police officers took him to the building of the Department of the Interior of Russia for the Khasavyurt District, allegedly, for providing evidence as a witness with regard to the murder committed in the settlement a few months ago in neighboring settlement. Aliyev remembers that he was taken to the room on the second floor and there two police officers started to beat him up: Deputy of the Head of Criminal Investigations of the Department of the Interior of Russia for the Khasavyurt District Ramazan Suleymanov and criminal investigations officer Yusoup Magomedov.
According to Aliyev, these police officers hit his feet, back and face, as well as made him stand near the wall with spread legs (put him on “spreader”) for over an hour in order to force confession of the rape of an underage neighbor girl.
Aliyev refused to provide false confessions and in the evening of the same day he was released home without drawing up any procedural documents or registration in the manual. Musa applied to the Khasavyurt City Hospital for medical assistance. Later on, the expert diagnosed Aliyev with brain concussion and contusion of soft tissues of the parietofrontal area, which inflicted a mild damage to health and were caused by the impact of a solid blunt object.
On 10 October, based on Musa Aliyev’s applying to the medical institution, the Khasavyurt Investigative Department of the Investigative Committee of the RF for the Republic of Dagestan initiated a criminal case under Part 3 of Article 286 of the Criminal Code of the RF (“abuse of office using violence”) with regard to police officers Suleymanov and Magomedov, and Aliyev was declared a victim.
In November, Ramazan Suleymanov and Yusoup Magomedov were taken into custody as defendants with regard to this crime.
However, on 9 and 10 December, the Khasavyurt District Court of the Republic of Dagestan passed a ruling to change the measure of restraint for the defendants to house arrest till 10 January 2020.
“The judges are acting in a rather controversial manner, – lawyer with the Committee Against Torture Abubakar Yangulbayev, representing the interests of victim Musa Aliyev, comments. – Initially, the police officers were put under house arrest, then this ruling was quashed and they were taken into custody and put to the Pre-Trial Detention Facility, now the measure of restraint is changed to house arrest, despite the fact that the custodial detention causes are still relevant. Magomedov and Suleymanov may continue to exert pressure on the victim as well as influence the progress of the investigation. According to our information, the Prosecutor’s Office have already submitted an appellate appeal against this court ruling”.