On March 5, 2013 the Supreme Court of Mary El Republic considered the appeal complaint of the Ministry of Finance RF on the decision of the Yoshkar Ola city court that imposed a compensation of 250000 rubles for moral harm inflicted by the criminal actions of the officers of MOI in Mary El. The Supreme Court left the decision unchanged and it entried into force.
(The photo shows the lawyer of IRPO “Committee against torture” Dmitry Yalikov with Ivan Kozlov and his father)
It is recalled, that on July 3, 2007 a citizen of Yoshkar Ola Ivan Kozlov appealed for help to the office of the Committee against torture in Mary El Republic. According to Ivan, about 5 p.m. of June 26 he was called together with his sister to the Department of Motor Vehicles and Traffic Control (DMVTC) to talk about a traffic accident. They didn’t know what traffic accident exactly, but still came in time. Under the pretext of personal identification Ivan Kozlov was asked to come to Zarechny police department of DIA of Yoshkar Ola; then only the man realized what he was supposed to do.
The policemen put handcuffs on him and started beating, demanding to confess murdering a girl he knew. The young man told them about the operation on the knee joint he had undergone lately, but the policemen didn’t fail to hit just the leg that hurt. Next day they took the young man to the Procuracy and only then to the hospital. Ivan Kozlov was informed that the real murderer of the girl was found only when he was in the hospital.
The preliminary investigation on the fact of police tortures has lasted for more than 4 years. The criminal proceedings were stopped several times, but were revived after the complaints of the lawyers of the Committee against torture.
On June 8, 2012 the court adjudged four policemen – the police operative of the operational search unit of MOI in Mary El Aleksey Pershunin and the officers of Zarechny police department: senior police operatives of crime detection Mikhail Dubnikov and Boris Belavin, the police operative Aleksey Shestakov. All four were found guilty in committing a crime provided for by paragraph “a”, “b” part 3 article 286 CC RF( excess of powers with violence and grave bodily harm). The court verdict inflicted a penalty of 1,5 years of imprisonment in a general regime colony on Pershunin and Dubnikov, and a penalty of 4 years of imprisonment conditionally on Shestakov and Belavin.
On December 24, 2012 in Yoshkar Ola city court of Mary El Republic there was a court session on the moral harm compensation application of Ivan Kozlov to the Ministry of Finance. The court awarded a compensation of 250 000 rubles to Kozlov. The Ministry of Finance didn’t agree with the court decision and filed an appeal complaint asking to reduce the compensation.
“Besides the defendant a representative of the republican MOI was also present at the court session, the latter supported the argument of the appeal complaint. However the court sustained our position and refused to reduce the compensation. I also want to remind those who care about government coffers that after the money is transferred to Ivan Kozlov the Ministry of Finance has a right of regressive action, they can exact the money from the convicted MOI officers. I suppose, that exercising this right would be a weighty measure to influence as the convicted former policemen, as the actual”, – claims Dmitry Yalikov, the lawyer of the Committee against torture who was present at the court as a representative of Ivan Kozlov.