Investigative mismanagement

The country's chief investigator fears persecution from colleagues

The scandal with the removal of the country's chief investigator - the head of the Main Investigation Department (GSU) of the Investigative Committee under the prosecutor's office, Dmitry Dovgiy, received a new continuation yesterday. At the end of last week, he was removed from his duties in connection with allegations of corruption received from his own subordinates. And yesterday he himself stated that he does not trust his boss, the Chairman of the Investigative Committee at the Prosecutor's Office (SKP) Alexander Bastrykin, fears persecution and provocations on his part and believes that even his, Dovgiya's, life is under threat. He wrote a statement about all this to the Prosecutor General's Office, asking for protection from his colleagues. As for the charges brought against Mr. Dovgy, the head of the State Investigative Directorate considered them to be someone’s political game and declared his complete innocence.

In addition, as Vremya Novostey learned, similar statements were written to the prosecutor’s office by three other employees of the State Investigative Directorate who were under suspicion of committing official crimes - the first deputy of Mr. Dovgiy Alexey Novikov, the head of one of the departments of the Main Investigation Directorate Sergei Glukhikh and Investigator for particularly important cases Yuri Ermakov. So far, all four have only been suspended from their positions, and an internal investigation is being carried out against them. However, according to our sources in the UPC, since the scandal went beyond the department and received wide publicity, the incident will no longer be able to be quietly buried within the walls of the department, getting off with statements from the named employees about leaving of their own free will. Most likely, sources believe, the suspensions will be followed by the initiation of criminal cases.

The scandal is truly becoming deafening and attracting increased attention. Including from the side of the Public Chamber, one of whose members, lawyer Anatoly Kucherena, yesterday considered it necessary to state that in the very near future, at a meeting of the chamber, the true background of the conflict within the UPC should be clarified. He said that the profile commission of the joint venture intends to invite experts and representatives of interested departments to its meeting. “It is important to understand what is actually happening: either this is really real abuse of office in the leadership of the committee, or an internal conflict related to personnel redistribution,” Mr. Kucherena said. — The suspicions of corruption brought against Dovgy are very serious. As an official of this level, he must either answer to the law, or if he is innocent, then defend his honor and reputation in court for libel. In general, this entire conflict and the publications that appear from time to time about intradepartmental tensions are unlikely to contribute to strengthening confidence on the part of citizens in relation to both the prosecutor’s office itself and its investigative apparatus. But these are bodies that are engaged in both the investigation of criminal cases and human rights activities.”

Among other security agencies, the scandal in the UPC caused a reaction in the Investigative Committee under the Ministry of Internal Affairs. According to our sources in this department, they extremely negatively assess the situation that has developed in the UPC and blame its leader, Mr. Bastrykin, for what happened. Tomorrow at a press conference, the leadership of the Investigative Committee under the Ministry of Internal Affairs intends to express their point of view. The fears of the police are understandable - if the failure of the SKP becomes obvious to everyone, then the recently carried out reform, as a result of which the prosecutor's office lost the most important powers to investigate and supervise criminal cases, should also be considered a failure. In this case, in particular, the Investigative Committee under the Ministry of Internal Affairs will lose its acquired independence and independence from prosecutors.

Meanwhile, tomorrow at the State Duma meeting, a bill on amendments to the Code of Criminal Procedure will be considered in the first reading, which will significantly expand the powers of the heads of investigative bodies, including, of course, the Investigative Committee. Legislators will have to add to the heads of investigative agencies the powers to initiate, investigate and terminate criminal cases to the extent that these functions were previously performed by prosecutors. And although these innovations are primarily of a technical nature, since they arise from the ongoing reform, it is unknown how smoothly the discussion will now go in the context of “hot news” from the UPC.

As the Vremya Novostey newspaper has already reported, a scandal with the removal of high-ranking investigators occurred last Friday, when it became known that Mr. Bastrykin was forced to remove from his post the head of the State Investigative Directorate, Dmitry Dovgiy, a key figure in his team. Together they worked side by side for seven years, and as head of the State Investigative Directorate, Mr. Dovgy investigated the most high-profile criminal cases of recent times, including the cases of Deputy Finance Minister Sergei Storchak and FSKN General Alexander Bulbov. At the same time, Bastrykin suspended three subordinates of the chief investigator. The reason for such drastic measures was the reports of two employees of the same Main Investigation Department, which cited facts incriminating the leadership of this unit of corruption.

Two investigators for particularly important cases, Zigmund Logis and Sergei Chernyshev, reported that Mr. Dovgy received two bribes. One - in the amount of $1.5 million - was allegedly received by the head of the State Investigative Directorate for the collapse of the case against the director of one large metropolitan company, Petro-Union. Another 2 million euros were presented as a bribe, which were given to him for the release on bail of one of the defendants in the Tomskneft case - deputy chairman of the board of Trust Bank Oleg Kolyada. As for investigators Glukhikh and Ermakov, their colleagues accused them of attempting to transfer the arrested St. Petersburg businessman Vladimir Barsukov-Kumarin from Matrosskaya Tishina to a pre-trial detention center in St. Petersburg, from where he could immediately be released.

Prosecutor General Yuri Chaika announced what happened at the SKP on Friday during his speech in the Federation Council. He did not name specific names, he only said that he did not see any scandal in this, that Mr. Bastrykin would figure everything out and, perhaps, would consult with him to make a decision. However, Mr. Dovgy, who has been officially on vacation in St. Petersburg since March 21, only learned of the charges brought against him on Saturday from media reports. According to sources in the prosecutor's office, the next day he contacted the Prosecutor General's Office for the North-Western District. He asked to be protected from possible attacks and provocations from his colleagues in the UPC and stated that he no longer trusted either his subordinates or his leadership. Mr. Dovgy complained that even before his official removal from office, “unknown persons in cars” were constantly following him, and his house in Moscow was constantly under surveillance. It soon became clear that the surveillance was carried out by employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and, as Mr. Dovgy told the prosecutors, he immediately informed Mr. Bastrykin about this, but he did not talk to him. Regarding the allegations, he said that “this is all nonsense”: “I categorically reject the suspicions and any talk of abuse on my part. An internal check is underway, it will clear everything up. I am not guilty of anything."

As Vremya Novostei learned, Mr. Dovgiy's subordinates - Novikov, Glukhikh and Ermakov, who also found themselves at the center of the corruption scandal, following the example of their direct leader, wrote similar statements to the Prosecutor General's Office. Sources in the UPC noted that all GSU employees support Mr. Dovgiy and condemn the chairman of the UPC. “Dovgiy had no choice, he had a feeling that he had been betrayed,” they said. - And Dovgy did the right thing in that, unlike the leadership, he did not remain silent and openly stated that he was taking measures to refute the accusations brought against him. It is clear that now Bastrykin has no choice but to initiate a criminal case after the end of the internal investigation, even despite the lack of direct evidence.”

As the Vremya Novostei newspaper has already reported, the Prosecutor General’s Office is conducting an audit of the activities of the Investigative Committee, since it considers its work ineffective and insufficiently professional, and the Prosecutor General constantly talks about the need to return control of the investigation to his department. Yesterday, our source in the Prosecutor General’s Office confirmed that now this check will be carried out with special care and will concern the legality of the decisions made by the Investigative Committee on all criminal cases initiated and rejected, as well as on statements from citizens. He also said that the prosecutor's office intends to send a request to the Department for Combating Organized Crime and Terrorism of the Ministry of Internal Affairs to provide security for Mr. Dovgy and his three subordinates who applied for protection.

The Investigative Committee under the Ministry of Internal Affairs, as stated by our sources in this department, believes that the situation that has developed in the UPC “has already crossed all boundaries of what is permitted”: “The fact that the conflict has become public may have a negative impact not only on the leadership of the UPC, but also on the entire investigation as a whole. Now the Prosecutor General’s Office has the right to question all previously made decisions of Mr. Dovgiy’s department. Usually such things are not brought up for public discussion; everything is decided quietly. But now it turns out that Bastrykin actually admitted his own incompetence - he failed to cope with the responsibilities assigned to him. It is possible that he will also lose his chair.”

It is noteworthy that all the talk about disagreements between the SKP and the Prosecutor General's Office, and indeed this entire corruption scandal in Bastrykin's department, representatives of all law enforcement agencies boil down to one thing - the possible creation in the near future of a unified federal investigation service (FIS). Despite the fact that no one has yet seen the corresponding bill, they talk about it as a fait accompli. Prosecutor General Chaika said on Friday in the Federation Council that he was and remains a supporter of the creation of a single Investigative Committee, and called it “a step forward.” At the same time, he modestly noted that he does not pretend to lead it. The chairman of the SKP, Bastrykin, recently spoke out against the creation of the FSR. He explained this by saying that the Investigative Committee at the Prosecutor's Office was created quite recently and, first of all, it is necessary to work on its formation, and not to come up with new structures. “I don’t see this idea as constructive,” he said. - I have a purely pragmatic approach here. We will burden ourselves with additional problems. And the most important thing is how to manage this entire structure. It’s one thing to lead a department with 16.5 thousand investigators, and another thing – 120 thousand people. In addition, if a single agency is created, additional funds are needed in order to equalize the salaries of all investigators. At the moment, investigators from the prosecutor’s office receive twice as much as investigators from the Ministry of Internal Affairs and drug control.”

Mr. Kucherena, in turn, at the end of last week called for a wide discussion of such a project: “Since the topic of the possible merger of the investigative apparatus of the prosecutor’s office, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and a number of other law enforcement agencies is widely discussed in society, in my opinion, it is necessary to hold public hearings on this issue and involve practitioners and experts in the discussion.”

As our source in the Ministry of Internal Affairs stated, “the FSR project already exists.” “The decision to create it was made at the highest level. That is why the staffing level of the Investigative Committee was recently increased by 40%, and that is why the positions of ten out of twelve deputy chairmen of the Investigative Committee, as well as the posts of heads of regional investigative units, still remain vacant,” the source said.

Ekaterina KARACHEVA, Ekaterina BUTORINA