Yesterday, on June 21, 2011 the Buguruslan city court (Orenburg region) finished the retrial of the criminal case against district investigator of the Buguruslan District Department of Internal Affairs Valery Prytkov charged with beating Valery Lyamov, resident of the village of Aksakovo (Orenburg region), to death on 19 December 2005.  

We would like to remind you that this criminal case was already tried once. In accordance with the first verdict passed on December 13, 2010 Prytkov was found guilty under under cl. «а», «b», «c» p. 3 art. 286 of the RF Criminal Code (“actions of state agents clearly exceeding their official powers and causing substantial violations of individual rights and legal interests committed with violent treatment, application of special tools and causing grave damage to health) and sentenced to five years of imprisonment in a standard security penal colony. Besides, Prytkov is to pay 150 000 rubles as compensation of moral damage to Lyamov’s relatives. Prosecutor’s Aide V. Yanchurkin appealed against the verdict considering it too lenient and the regional court supported his position by quashing the judgment. Strangely enough, the position of the prosecution changed in the course of six months. During a recent hearing prosecutor V. Yanchurkin asked the court to sentence the defendant to 5 years and …6 months in prison.

In response to our request for comments, Interdistrict Prosecutor Vladislav Kryzhanovsky failed to explain the stand of his aide clearly, but promised to investigate the situation. The verdict will be pronounced on July 4, 2011. Frankly speaking, the Buguruslan Interdistrict Prosecutor’s Office’s trick complicated the court’s choice – either to issue an almost identical verdict or to sentence the defendant to a longer term that asked by the prosecution. The Committee Against Torture will closely monitor this intricate situation.