Two months later, a case was opened regarding the beating of Omsk human rights activists

A criminal case has been opened in the Omsk region regarding the beating of members of the “Public Control” movement, employees of the press service of the regional “Committee for Human Rights” Ruslan Alekhin and Alexander Sedelnikov, which occurred on January 16. This was reported in the digest of the Glasnost Defense Foundation. Human rights activists were beaten one day on different streets of the regional center Bolsherechye when they were returning from a court hearing. Both attackers were wearing masks. The disabled Sedelnikov was beaten with a black rubber baton. The attacker also smashed a hard drive containing video recordings of court hearings, which, according to human rights activists, took place in the Bolsherechensk court with numerous violations. A man in a mask hit Alekhine on the head with a metal rod. As a result, he received a closed head injury, a brain contusion and a depressed fracture of the parietal bone. According to doctors, he might not survive. Both victims were admitted to intensive care after the attack. The human rights activists left the hospital only after a month and a half. As the chairman of the regional “Human Rights Committee” Valentin Kuznetsov said, the case was not opened for a long time: investigators argued that they needed to wait until the victims were discharged in order to receive a final diagnosis and correctly qualify the criminal case. As a result, investigators opened a case under paragraph “e” of Part 2 of Article 111 of the Criminal Code (intentional infliction of grievous bodily harm for hooligan reasons).