From: MSN NicknameEagle_wng (Original Message) Sent: 8/1/2005 2:47 AM
20.7.2005 17:55 MSK
Torture in Russia
A majority of Russians fear the arbitrariness of the country’s law enforcement bodies: those organs of the state which should be engaged in the fight against crime. On the occasions members of the militia do appear before a court on charges of torture, then a conviction is, as a rule, followed by a conditional sentence.
According to a survey carried out in June by the Yuri Levada analytical centre on behalf of an organisation Public Verdict, 71.9% of those polled said they distrusted the militia and the courts. The figure is on the increase…
The way the organs of law enforcement work is especially conducive to the use of torture. The main guideline for the militia is the percentage of cases “successfully” closed. The militia often catch people who were unconnected with the crime under investigation, as it can be difficult or even dangerous to catch the real criminals, and often prefer those detainees from whom threats and torture can produce a confession.
Many thousands of people employed in the various organs of domestic power served in Chechnya, where they could ignore all laws and terrorise the local inhabitants to their hearts’ content. Returning to “civilian life” in Russia, they then use their “military experience” on the inhabitants of Russia proper.
Public Verdict follows cases of unlawful violence against citizens by law-enforcement bodies. In most cases, torture is used to extract confessions of involvement in crime. In addition, torture can help to dissuade potential witnesses from offering evidence, or force people into unwilling cooperation with the law enforcement organs, or intimidate witnesses before interrogation. People are also tortured to extort money, or simply for no reason at all.
Instruments of torture include pre-heated irons, gas marks to induce suffocation, handcuffs, alcohol, drugs to stupefy the detainee under interrogation, hammers, pistols to intimidate by simulating a shot, truncheons, chairs, poles, belts or electric currents.
Such tortures were carried out on a detainee named Chernykh. He was picked up on 13 May last year and taken to a militia station near Kazan. The officers, including a functionary named Lyamzin, started demanding a signed confession. Upon the detainee’s refusal, he was handcuffed with his hands under his knees. A pole was then inserted between his knees and handcuffed hands, and with the pole held by the backs of two chairs, he was left suspended for twenty minutes. During this time his feet and buttocks were beaten by officers, and his head was forced towards his feet by use of a tightened belt.
Then tumbled to the floor, Chernykh had his underwear lowered and a padded jacket forced over his head. With one officer sitting on his feet and another forcing his mouth closed, an electrode was pushed between his buttocks. Unable to sustain the torture any longer, the detainee wrote down everything that was demanded of him.
To cover up their crimes, militia officers use various means, from falsifying documents to murdering torture victims and disposing secretly of their corpses. Victims of torture have in some cases died subsequently or been crippled.
Such torturers are mostly to be found among investigating officers, inspectors, militia chiefs, even motor licence inspectors.
Data supplied by Public Verdict suggests less than 40% of those found guilty in cases which make it to court were sentenced to periods of detention. The remainder received suspended sentences or were fined. The majority of the convicted were forbidden by the court to work for the militia for varying periods of time. Every third victim obtained compensation, but amounts involved were insignificant.
The chairman of the Nizhniy Novgorod organisation Committee against Torture, Igor Kalyapin, is certain that Russian judges are privately instructed to issue suspended sentences to members of the militia found guilty of torture, rather than imprison them. The suspended sentences were no accident. This was proved by appeals to higher instances being unsuccessful.
Mara Polyakova, chairwoman of the Independent Expert-Legal Council, a part of the International Commission of Russian Lawyers, notes that the State Prosecutor does not provide high-grade legal assistance to victims of torture. When the Prosecutor charged militiamen, this was usually the result of a compromise reached with the militia. Law enforcement bodies hand over a few employees: those who had not pleased their bosses.
Boris Zolotukhin, a well-known lawyer, said the main reason for the use of torture spreading throughout the law enforcement bodies was the absence of political will to combat it.
The country’s leaders have no personal interest in establishing order in the militia. They themselves are not threatened by torture. Until the day the leadership is replaced, Russians will have to fear the bandits in uniform more than those without.
Dmitri BELOMESTNOV
Translated Michael Garrood
http://www.prima-news.ru/eng/news/articles/2005/7/20/32991.html
