Magnitsky case on "Forum 2000" in Prague

Irina Lagunina: On Monday, the 15th conference was opened in Prague in the framework of “Forum 2000”, the annual meeting of intellectuals, which was started at the end of the last century by the president of the Czech Republic Vaclav Gavel. The theme of this year is legality and democracy. In connection with this problem, the head of the Hermitage investment fund William Brauder participated in the discussion about Russia. Let me remind you, two years ago, a lawyer of this fund Sergei Magnitsky died in the Moscow pre -trial detention center. And the circumstances of this death, like the lack of justice in this case, caused a protest of the international community. William Brauder was a guest of our studio. The case of Sergey Magnitsky externally seems very confusing. In fact, I agree with the head of the Russian branch of TRASPARENCY International Elena Panfilova that he needs to be divided into three cases. First: the death of Magnitsky and the guilty in it. Second: accusations against Magnitsky himself, because of which he got into the investigative insulator (this is now, after his death, he has renewed against him). And the third - the accusations that Sergei Magnitsky made against law enforcement officers and tax authorities that they took advantage of the three enterprises seized in your office, then to re -register them and, using fraud, withdraw taxes from the Russian treasury in the amount of $ 230 million. So, let's start in order. What is new about the circumstances of the death of Sergei Magnitsky in jail?

William Brauder: This is probably the most shocking of all affairs, because Sergey was an unusual representative in the world of prisoners in Russia. During all these 358 days, while they mocked him and tortured him in prison, he recorded everything that happened to him, in the form of criminal complaints of an inappropriate appeal. In total, for 358 days in conclusion, he wrote 450 complaints, which, perhaps, is unprecedented, if we evaluated from the point of view of abuse of justice by the authorities. The authorities never responded to any of these complaints. But we received copies of these complaints from his lawyers and compiled a library, which shows who, what and at what moment he was doing against him. These documents unequivocally show that Sergey was tortured and ultimately killed. And despite the fact that even the adviser to the President of Russia on human rights a year after the incident was forced to intervene and begin his own independent investigation of law enforcement agencies, despite their own conclusion that he was illegally arrested, that he had been tortured and killed, almost two years from the date of his death, not a single representative of law enforcement, not a single judge, not a single prison employee, not a single prison worker. Punishment for what happened to Sergey. They found Kozlov by the remembrance of two prison doctors who are actually responsible for what happened. But these are only two people out of 60, whose participation we revealed in this death.

Irina Lagunina: You recently published a statement that new certificates have been found confirming that before the death of Sergei Magnitsky tortured. And this, perhaps, led to death. When he was transferred from Butyrki to the “sailor silence” in critical condition and with monstrous pain, he was not placed in the medical room, he was placed in a separate camera and invited riot police to look after a violent patient. Why did these documents become the property of publicity only now?

William Brauder: When he was buried, several people photographed an open coffin. And in the photographs it is clearly seen that Sergey’s fingers are black or bruised. This was the first indication that we do not know something in this matter. But state bodies refused to provide materials about the autopsy or, as it is called, posthumous medical examination. In total, there were four of these examinations. And only after Sergey’s mother and I filed several claims with a demand to provide us with materials, information gradually began to receive information. In the monstrous photographs of his body, torn wounds on the wrists of several centimeters are visible, traces of terrible violence are visible. As far as I understand, in the process of gradual investigation and receipt of information in this case, the public observation commission for the places of imprisonment, in the end, received these documents confirming that in the last hours of his life, 8 riot police officers beat Sergey. Similarly, we just received very important information that three days after Sergey died one of the investigators in a local police station, who simply did not know that the whole case had to be hidden, he was not instructed, recommended to open a case on the murder of Sergei Magnitsky. But this recommendation was quickly buried. Only a matter of negligence was opened.

Irina Lagunina: I’ll explain one moment - the body of the family, as the lawyer of Magnitsky’s mother claims, at first did not want to give out at all, and then issued on the condition that he would be buried in a closed coffin. What did not happen. But how did the local police station be involved in all this?

William Brauder: Because the family immediately, the day after his death, said that it was a deliberate murder. So in the local police station they looked at all the circumstances of what happened and considered that there was enough evidence that the murder occurred, and therefore, a criminal case should be open. But then all this was furious and buried. And this became known only a few weeks ago.

Irina Lagunina: The mother of Sergei Magnitsky turned to the investigative and prison bodies with requests to provide her with the materials of medical research on the body of her son and tissue samples. But she was refused. How are things going in this direction?

William Brauder: Sergey's mother sent a total of more than 30 requests. She wanted to get all the documentation in order to make her own picture of what happened and who is responsible for this. 90 percent of the queries were refused. Each such refusal was adopted by her lawyers. And in each case, the courts made a decision in favor of law enforcement agencies. But here, in fact, two goals are pursued. Firstly, of course, to receive documents that will shed light on the circumstances of Sergey's death. And secondly, each such refusal shows the whole world: here is the government, which states that it is seriously related to the investigation of this case, but it refuses to provide information in all legal requests. So what are they hiding?

Irina Lagunina: Let me remind you, we are talking with the head of the Hermitage Foundation William Brauder. Recently, Russian law enforcement agencies resumed the case against Sergei Magnitsky, the very fact that he allegedly did not pay taxes in 2001, for which he was arrested in 2008. I understand that everything is possible in Russia. And it is even possible that this case will reach the court and the court will take the side of the prosecution and runs that Magnitsky is guilty of tax failure. In your opinion, that this will give those people who brought him to death in jail?

William Brauder: Understand, representatives of the Russian state are trying to pole themselves in the eyes of the international community. They think that they can then present such an argument: we have a court decision that he was arrested legal, how can you argue with the court decision? This is their logic. Nothing in Russia has changed over the past 60 years. In the same way in Stalin's times, before people were sent to the Gulag to death, they knocked out confessions of their own guilt. In order to write down on paper later - this person himself admitted. This is the same legal bureaucratic mentality that was in Stalin's times, but only embodied in 2011.

Irina Lagunina: You also track the fate of these 230 million dollars, which were removed from the Russian treasury as a refund. Is there news in this area?

William Brauder: We set ourselves such a goal: if we cannot punish the guilty of the death of Sergey within Russia, since they are covered by law enforcement agencies, then we will find out where their money is, we will freeze their accounts, we will not give them access to their property. It seems to me that these people never even suspected that all these crimes could surfacing the surface. Usually they go unnoticed. But due to the fact that Sergei died, we did not stop and stop. Then we made a list of 60 people. All these surnames are on official documents. Here, for example, is Lieutenant Colonel of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Artem Kuznetsov. He earns 10 thousand a year. And then we looked at the registration registers of property. And - one, two, three coincidences! The property that Kuznetsov himself owns or his relatives owns. Earth, apartments, cars, trips - all together is 3 million dollars. 3 million with an income of 10 thousand per year. We did the same with Pavel Karpov, another investigator of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Property for 1.3 million with a salary of 10 thousand dollars a year. We posted this information on the site "Stop the untouchables!" And they invited readers of the site to become detectives. And every week we get one or two messages. Many are incorrect, but sometimes we get golden information. That is how the man came out on us last summer, who knew people in the same tax administration, which overnight on the eve of the Christmas of 2007 seized $ 230 million from the state treasury. Based on these documents, we later managed to confirm that these tax inspectors passed more than $ 20 million through Swiss banks. We provided information to the Swiss authorities, and they froze the score.

Irina Lagunina: We talked with the head of the Hermitage Foundation William Brauder.

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  Irina Lagunina

  Head of Special Projects of Russian Service Radio Liberty

  Laguninai@rferl.org