"Golden Eagle" under the wing

Vitaliy Goncharenko, who previously released from the custody of the Court of Appeal of Kyiv, and three of his colleagues in the former Kharkov division "Berkut", Alexander Kostyuk, Vladislav Master, Artem Voilokov, left for Russia. They stated this themselves in a video message published on YouTube.

“We ensured public order, counteracting the radicals, protecting the life, health and safety of law -abiding citizens,” the Berkutians read the text by roles on the video, “after the victory of the so -called“ Revolution of the Division ”, we have been undergoing criminal prosecution from various state bodies and the deceived part of the population and society.” The authors of the appeal stated that their families have deprived the means existence was subjected to psychological pressure.

The reason for the departure, according to the Berkutovites, was the performance of the head of the Department of Special Investigations of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine Sergey Gorbatyuk. He called the decision of the Kyiv appeal court illegal, who released Goncharenko from custody for an obligation to turn out. On April 7, he also stated that the Prosecutor General’s Office was considering the opportunity to open a criminal case against the judges who made this decision. The video message of the Berkutovites says that after these threats, "hopes for an honest consideration of the case have disappeared."

The lawyer of the suspects Valentin Rybin told the Censor.NOT publication that the departure of his clients cannot be called a flight, since Kostyuk, the Lyubov and Voilokov ended the terms of preventive measure, and Goncharenko is obliged to come to court, but the jurisdiction of the case has not yet been determined. "On April 13, they quietly got on a bus and drove to Russia. On domestic passports, openly and absolutely calm," the lawyer said.

Vitaly Goncharenko, together with his colleague Alexander Belov, is suspected of murdering three Maidan activists on February 18, 2014 in the serf lane and dozens of assassination assassines. In addition, he, like Alexander Kostyuk, participated in the attack on Gromadsky journalists Anastasia Stanko and Konstantin Reutsky in January 2015. The police stopped the journalists returning from a business trip in the ATO zone, began to check their things, stole the camera, threw Reutskiy on the ground and beat them with their feet. Vladislav Mimogu and Artem Voilokov are suspected of being dropped from the colonnade on the Grushevsky Street two protesters from the colonnade in January 2014.

Goncharenko, Master, Voilokov and Belov was detained in June 2016. Goncharenko was in jail until November, after that he was transferred under house arrest, in March, the Pechersk court of Kyiv again detained him for two months, and the Court of Appeal on April 4 abolished this decision. According to the lawyer Rylin, Voilokov and Maystega were under house arrest until April 13, and a preventive measure in the form of a personal obligation about the turnout was elected in relation to Kostyuk.

At the end of October 2015, the assistant to the prosecutor general of Ukraine Vladislav Kutsenko said that Viktor Yanukovych, who then held the post of president of Ukraine, personally ordered the use of weapons against activists of Euromaidan.

On February 5, 2016, President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko said that all those guilty of the deaths of the Maidanians must be held accountable , including those who gave criminal orders.

In February last year, Gorbatyuk announced the transfer of the first cases to the court of the accused of murders on the Maidan. According to him, the Prosecutor General of Ukraine continues the investigation of the events of February 2014. According to the Ministry of Health of Ukraine, starting on February 18, 2014, 1528 people were injured in the center of Kyiv in clashes, 103 people died. On February 20, according to the public sector of the Maidan, 42 people were killed in the center of the Ukrainian capital.