Without trace and investigation

Ilya Rozhdestvensky - about how Russian police are trying citizens

In the suburbs, after interrogation in the police, a member of the Group "Firebird" Sergey Pestov died. On September 4, the police broke into the garage, where he rehearsed with his friends, put on all handcuffs and began to beat the musician. Then he was taken to the station. Pestov needed medical care; Doctors who came to the department stated that he was in a coma of the third degree. The tortures of the detainees and death in police branches in Russia have long become a familiar phenomenon. According to the Russian Ebola project, from the beginning of 2015, at least 160 people died in the plots. Every year, the courts take hundreds of sentences for torture, but it is almost impossible to assess the real scale of the police violence. At the request of Medusa, the journalist of “Echo of Moscow” Ilya Rozhdestvensky tells how people are trying in Russia during interrogations.

Caution: the text contains descriptions of violence scenes. We urge the impressionable not to read this material.

Around noon, Olga Maslova was supposed to come to the Nizhny Novgorod District Internal Affairs Directorate to answer the questions of investigators in the murder case. The girl was in the status of a witness. However, as soon as she crossed the threshold of cabinet No. 63, they demanded that she admit that she stole the things of the murdered. When she refused to do this, two policemen began to scream at her, then a football scarf with the symbols of CSKA was torn off her and the same scarf began to whip her on the head. Then one of the policemen came out, and the second locked the office from the inside; He put on the handcuffs on Maslov and raped her. After an hour and a half, she was allowed to go to the toilet and put herself in order, and when she returned, they began to beat in her stomach. They put a gas mask on the girl and blocked the air. In addition, wires were brought to her earrings and an electric current was passed through them.

Two hours later, Olga Maslova was ready to give any testimony, but the bullying did not end there. The investigator of the local prosecutor who joined the police saw the girl's scarf of the “army” and demanded that Maslova insult the football club. The girl was continued to beat. In the evening, being in the toilet, she tried to open her veins, but she failed to do it. After that, two police officers raped it for a few more hours. About ten in the evening, Maslov was released. None of the police officers were brought to justice. Maslova was able to achieve compensation only through the ECHR.

The case of Olga Maslova in a sense is unique-it contains almost all the main methods of torture that are used in the police.

Typically, police violence begins with psychological pressure: they promise to beat or put for a long time, threaten with rape, put on the wall and “shoot” with idle cartridges, they say that they would drink a “grinder” (as it was in the case of the murder of Boris Nemtsov Anzor Gubashev). For several days, a person can be left in a basement with a bag on his head. Also, screams for help may be heard from the next room; At the same time, the police tell their victim that one of his relatives screams.

If threats do not help, law enforcement officers are moving from words to deeds - and here it all depends on how much the policeman is afraid that he will then be held accountable. If the criminal case seems to be unlikely, then the most primitive means that leave traces on the victim’s body are used. The detainees are beaten with their hands, batons, chairs, any improvised objects, pierce drum membranes with ballpoint handles, put a pencil in the nostrils, drive needles under the nails. So, Ahmed Gisaev, abducted by the Russian military in 2003, was beaten for 16 days. After that, according to him, his hair did not grow on his head for four months. To one of the most brutal tortures, Zubaire Zubayraev was subjected to, who in 2007 was convicted for five years to attack an employee of power structures and storage of weapons. He was beaten by both police officers and employees of the FSIN system.

“He was nailed his feet to the floor. When he told me this, I honestly did not believe it, ”his lawyer Mus Hadisov told the human rights activists ( from the materials provided by the“ Meduz ”human rights organization“ Agora ” ). - He took off his socks and showed me: on the right and left feet, the input and weekend of the nonsense holes from the nails are visible. He was also beaten on the kidneys with a bottle filled with water. Even the doctors beat him. Well, the operatives, this is at least somehow explained, but the doctors! You can conclude what treatment can be from these doctors. ”

“He did not own his body. I could neither sit nor stand, ”said the sister of the convicted Malik Zubayraeva. -His hand was festering: Zubair said that the deputy prison doctor, a certain Novikov, poured some powder on the wounds so that they would not pass. Even his brother said that the top layer of the skin was sewn on his wrist, and the cut tendons were left. ”

The next stage is sexual violence, which not only women, but also men, as happened in the Kazan police department “Dalniy”, are subjected to . In this case, bottles, batons and other objects can be used. Moreover, rape is a kind of guarantee that the victim will not want to write a statement later: few will be able to repeatedly reproduce all the details of what happened so that they are entered in the protocol and voiced in court; And for representatives of the criminal world, this is even an “insurmountable threshold”, said Pavel Chikov, chairman of the Association of Human Rights Rights Superior Organizations.

If the police do not want to leave traces of the victim’s body, they use various tricks. In the case of beatings, bottles of water and bags filled with sand are used. They also beat through a wet towel or through a thick cloth - there is no abrasion and hematomas on the body, but with a sufficiently strong blow, everything can end with a severe trauma or a concussion.

There are almost no traces after torture with electric shock - only small black dots. Such a torture is called “Call Putin”, “Polygraph Poligraphych”, “Chubais”, “Internet”, “Death Machine” and “Ptashka”. The latter is from the abbreviation of PT - a field phone. To get a high voltage current, but with a small force, they take an old electrician device a megommeter, a condenser subversive machine or a field phone that has a dynamummashinki. It does not leave burns or a stun gun. At the same time, a person experiences such pain, as if nerves are pulled out of him. The case is known when the detained Igor Peskarev, during torture, twitched with such force that he literally broke the handcuff, which was fastened. The accused of the murder of Boris Nemtsov and Ukrainian director Oleg Sentsov claimed to be tortured.

“They have a“ twist ”so electric - a small apparatus with a pen. Two wires with clamps came from him. They were attached to the earlobe of the ear, ”Igor Akhrimenko, subjected to tortured by the“ Kommersant ”, explained . - I was chained to the battery, and I held another one by my legs, and the second by my head. They asked me questions and twisted the pen. First, slowly, then faster. When they quickly twisted, I just lost consciousness. He lost five times. "

No less popular among the police and the “elephant”: the detainee is put on a gas mask and block air access. When a person begins to suffocate, he is beaten to cause rapid breathing, a person often loses consciousness from a lack of oxygen. Dichlophos can also be injected into a gas mask, pour ammonia or other liquid with a caustic smell, after which a person begins to choke in vomiting directly in the gas mask, as itwas , for example, with the person involved in Sentsov, Gennady Afanasyev. The option of an “elephant” called “Store” or “Supermarket” is also known: in this case, instead of gas mask, a plastic bag is used.

“At first they simply beat, and then the handcuffs were put on and-hands behind their backs, put it on a chair, put a gas mask on their heads and squeezed the phone,” 15-year-old Oleg Fetisov claimed in a conversation with human rights activists. - It was repeated about four times. The first and second time I was almost losing consciousness, they took off the gas mask, and I sat on a chair, they gave me a rest. For about a minute they kept without air, maybe a little longer. ”

The torture of the “elephant” ended in almost complete blindness for graduate student-mathematician Boris Botvinnik. He did not experience any problems with law enforcement agencies before meeting with law enforcement agencies. “When they searched, they found a gas mask, put it on me, plugged the breathing valve and began to ask me something. Then they decided to interrupt, invited the witnesses. The witnesses were present for about ten minutes. Then they brought me out into the street, beaten for half an hour and dragged into the room again. There they took me to another room, got a cellophane bag from my bag and put it on my head. From time to time, the operative came in. As far as I understand, he clarified some details there, since the special forces themselves did not know what to do. A package on the head, blows on the forehead and ears, sometimes, when he held his breath for a long time, they still beaten into a solar plexus. ”

A special place in the torture system is occupied by various binding . They almost do not leave visible traces on the body, but threaten with sprains and ruptures. So, when the detainee is tortured in the “swallows” pose, his arms and legs are tied behind him, while handcuffs put on his arms and legs. This causes a sharp pain in the joints, blocks the blood supply to the wrists and can lead to a dislocation of the shoulder or forearm. Then the detainee is suspended and begin to beat. In the “envelope” or “TV” position, the hands are shaken into handcuffs, the victim is planted on the floor, the legs are tied with a cable, which is then passed through the neck, having previously thrown a towel over it so that there are no traces. After that, the cable attracts the head to the legs and fixed between the bent knees. Another option - the arms and legs are binded behind the back, then the person is placed on the stomach and beaten.

The “TV” is also called torture, when the detainee forces in the position of the semi -prostate to keep in front of him on his outstretched hands a stool with a seat to his face, thus imitating the TV screen. There is a variation of the “TV” - a video, that is, two paired stools. It was precisely such a mockery that Private Andrei Sychev was subjected to such a mockery: as a result, he had positional squeezing of the lower extremities and genitals, Gangren began.

“Stretching”, “lick” or “rodshka”, which is a variant of medieval torture, is a little less common: they fetter their hands behind the victim, raise them up and cling to a metal rod - they are suspended so that there is no support under the feet. Also, the victim can be forced to spend several days standing, sometimes in the closet. Or the detainee is placed on a wooden bench, chained with handcuffs, and a rope is tied to the leg. Then the rope is thrown through one of the legs of the bench and pulled to the side, stretching the inguinal muscles and ligaments. Such torture is called "Slavka."

In the insulators (as well as in colonies and the army) they practice “refrigerator” or “Karbyshev” named General Dmitry Karbyshev, who died in a concentration camp during the Great Patriotic War. A person in the cold is taken out into the street, stripped naked, fastened with handcuffs and left for several hours. From time to time it can be poured with cold water. The opposite version of this torture is “stove”: the victim is left in a closed space in the sun. Usually they do this with the defendants when transporting from pre -trial detention center to court: “glass” 60 by 60 centimeters, in which a person in a car carrier is located, can be inflamed up to 50 degrees.

In colonies where there are usually not required to hide traces of beatings, FSIN employees resort to riot police. Special forces abandoned to suppress the riots of convicts are distinguished by animal cruelty. One of these cases convicted ITK-4 of the Nizhny Novgorod region described in their messages.

“The riot police entered the area with weapons and began to beat and mock the persons who were at this time in penalties and in chamber -type premises. They beat their feet and batons, strangled to loss of consciousness with a towel, then cast with cold water. They beat this: “article, term” - and after an answer they begin to beat. Several people scored to the loss of consciousness, then put their heads in the Parasha. “Chinese torture” was also used. They fell on the table and beat on the heels with a club. They forced to sit on the twine and also beat. We went into the camera, asked who would wash the floor, they did not want to take it to the corridor and also beat. They poured a man to the floor, held their hands and legs, and one stood on his back or on his chest and jumped. They undressed to the goal and beat. We got on the table and beat their feet in the face. ”

The practice of torture was obviously widespread in the Soviet Union, says Pavel Chikov. On the one hand, it is well known about the facts of systematic bullying in the army. It was from the former military personnel that they later recruited to the police, so it can be argued that together with the personnel, these methods migrated from the armed forces to law enforcement agencies. On the other hand, in the late 1980s, the police faced an increase in crime and the nascent criminal groups. The level of cruelty of criminals grew, and the “opera” answered it with the same cruelty. Moreover, if official reports in which the cases of torture in the USSR were recorded, then they are intended only for internal use.

* * *

It is extremely difficult to evaluate how many people in the country annually become victims of torture. The actions of the police in this case are qualified under the article “Exceeding official authority with the use of violence” (part 3 of article 286 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation; up to ten years of colony). Over the four years, the number of sentences under this article has almost doubled: from 1651 in 2011 to 961 in 2014 ( the data was provided by Medusa by the Judicial Department at the Supreme Court ). The problem is that other crimes that are not related to torture fall under the composition of this article. And it is impossible to single out only police officers from general statistics. In addition, about 30 people are justified by this article annually. But only 161 people received real terms in the last year (they will mainly spend up to five years behind bars), the rest got off with fines (up to 100 thousand rubles) and conditional terms. In general, these figures reflect a certain trend that human rights activists are talking about: bringing operatives to responsibility for torture is a non -trivial task; Such criminal cases are extremely reluctant.

In 2004, human rights activists from the “Committee against torture” achieved the first real term in their practice in the case of beating the law enforcement agencies detained by employees ( data from the book “Public Investigation of Torture” ). For three years, the colony was received by the head of the Bolshaboldinsky regional department of the internal affairs of the Nizhny Novgorod region, Major Ivan Furotakov. As the investigation established, on February 2, 2003, he learned that criminal authorities from Saransk would come to the bar of the local hotel. The major decided to personally attend the Strelka, but as a result, all the operational work came down to the fact that, along with two police officers, he drank vodka until four in the morning. Already at dawn, he caught the eye of a former hotel guard Alexander Dolgashev. With the words "You will tell me everything now!" The major began to beat a 24-year-old kid on the kidneys. The chief witness of the quarters then promised to "unscrew his head."

This business is the result of painstaking and long work. Not always such work ends with criminal cases: “their own” human rights activists are rarely given without a fight. So it was, for example, in the case of Oleg Sentsov. According to his lawyer Dmitry Dinze, in the decision of the Investigative Committee it was noted that "the Ukrainian director was fond of Sado-Mazo, and some partner was inflicted on his back shortly before the detention." However, no objects in the house of Sentsov, indicating his tendency to BDSM, were found. The defendant of the “swamp business” Leonid Razvozzhaev, activist of “other Russia” Taisiya Osipova, nationalist Daniil Konstantinov and many others complained to torture torture. Regularly report torture in colonies , insulators and ships.

The situation was different only once and only in one region: after the events in the Dalniy Police Department, the head of the UK Alexander Bastrykin ordered to raise all the cases of police violence in a few years and give them a move if the materials were the results of the medical examination, and the victim was ready to go to court. В результате за несколько лет число дел о пытках выросло многократно, но затем упало почти до нуля — в Татарстане просто пересажали всех, кто был причастен к истязаниям. Нулевая терпимость к пыткам сохраняется в республике до сих пор, и полицейские понимают, что лучше не рисковать.

«Грубо говоря, пересажали прорву оперативников, которые всегда были неприкосновенными. Почти у каждого „опера“ есть бывший напарник или коллега, который был осужден по этой статье. Но это в одном регионе в связи с одним случаем после прямого указания Бастрыкина», — рассказывает Павел Чиков из «Агоры». По его мнению, если сейчас Александр Бастрыкин и Юрий Чайка дадут такую же команду по всей стране, то с пытками будет покончено в течение нескольких лет.

Ilya Rozhdestvensky

Moscow