НАСТОЯЩИЙ МАТЕРИАЛ (ИНФОРМАЦИЯ) ПРОИЗВЕДЕН, РАСПРОСТРАНЕН И (ИЛИ) НАПРАВЛЕН ИНОСТРАННЫМ АГЕНТОМ «КОМАНДА ПРОТИВ ПЫТОК» ЛИБО КАСАЕТСЯ ДЕЯТЕЛЬНОСТИ ИНОСТРАННОГО АГЕНТА «КОМАНДА ПРОТИВ ПЫТОК» | 18+
21-year-old Akim Andreyev ended up in the pre-trial detention center no. 10 in Mozhaysk after a «sincere» confession to selling drugs. The young man told the attorney from the Crew Against Torture that he signed that confession after numerous beatings and threats from the drug enforcement agents.
On 1 August, Akim’s friend Daniil came to visit Akim to return the money he had borrowed earlier. As Akim recalls, that friend said that he had lost money and called him to look in the entryway. As soon as the young people left the apartment, two unknown men attacked Akim.
«They struck me in the head and the neck, laid me face down on the stairs, suffocated me with their elbows, and hit me on the back. Handcuffs were tightened on the hands from behind as tightly as possible, so that my hands lost sensitivity. For a while, I passed out.»
Mr. Andreyev indicates that later he learned that the officers’ names were Ruslan and Artur. Akim was taken back to the apartment, forced to unlock his mobile phone and then was ordered to follow the policemen. He was not allowed to take clothes, so he left the building in shorts and a T-shirt. According to Mr. Andreyev, there were handcuffs on his hands, which Artur pulled down so that Akim’s hands hurt even more.
Akim does not remember some of the events well and says that because of the blows to the head, everything was in a fog. According to Mr. Andreyev, he was put into a car where Ruslan periodically hit him on the head and threatened him with «rape with a truncheon.» Akim was taken to the Lesnogorodskiy police station of the Odintsovo city district. As Mr. Andreyev recalls, he was beaten there again, being demonstrated with a real truncheon.
About three hours later, according to Akim, an officer named Gorin came into the office and demanded that Mr. Andreyev was to sign a confession.
«The officers beat me even in his presence, but Gorin just behaved as if I were not in the room,» – recalls Mr. Andreyev.
In the late afternoon, as Akim claims, Artur put into Akim’s pocket five thousand rubles, allegedly received by Mr. Andreyev after selling drugs. The young man recalls that he was tired of the ill-treatment, he was afraid of rape, he wanted to see his family, so he agreed to incriminate himself. He was denied the opportunity to call a lawyer, but was allowed to call his father. When Akim’s father arrived, the police, according to the young man, extorted two million rubles from the father in order to release his son.
Close to midnight, as Akim recalls, he was transferred to a cell where he spent the night. In the morning, the same officers took him to the emergency room in the Odintsovo Central District Hospital. The doctor recorded a bruise on the young man’s neck. Mr. Andreyev underlines that he could not tell the doctor about other injuries because the policemen were nearby. During the interrogation, Akim informed the investigator that he was beaten and a marked banknote was planted on him for allegedly selling drugs.
Despite Andreyev’s words about the signed confession after being tortured in the police station, a criminal case was opened against the young man for the illegal sale of drugs (Article 228.1 of the Criminal Code). The court put him to the pre-trial detention center until 2 October.
The commentary of the CAT lawyer:
«This is not the first time we are working on a case where the victim claims that he incriminated himself after being tortured. Therefore, we do not exclude that what happened to Akim is true. We filed a crime report in the interests of Andreyev, but since he is in a pre-trial detention center, it is difficult for human rights activists to obtain evidence without the aid of the official investigation.»