In Chita, security forces took a Jehovah's Witness into the forest and tortured him with electric shocks

Chita Jehovah's Witness Vadim Kutsenko was tortured with electric shocks and beaten in the forest after mass searches of believers. The press service of the religious association reported this to OVD-Info.

Kutsenko was taken from his mother-in-law’s apartment on the evening of February 10 and put in a company car, in which they beat him and tortured him with electric shock to extract a confession. After some time, the car was stopped in the forest. There the detainee was forced to get out of the car, threatening to stage an escape attempt. After which Kutsenko was made to face the car and began to be beaten.

As lawyer Arthur Ganin told The Insider , the security forces “used a choke hold and at that moment they shocked with a stun gun. The current was applied to the legs and stomach. They hit me in the face and cervical spine.” The security forces also threatened that Kutsenko would be raped in the zone.

The lawyer added that the security forces also threatened another Jehovah’s Witness detained that day. “Your wife will be raped, and we will record it all on video and show it to you,” the lawyer reports the words of the employees.

When law enforcement officers realized that Kutsenko would not testify, they took him to the investigator. There, the detainee reported torture, but the investigator ignored him and sent him to a temporary detention facility along with the same employees.

The believer is in custody. No later than February 15, the court must choose a preventive measure against him.

• On February 10, in Chita and its environs, mass searches were carried out at the premises of Jehovah's Witnesses in the case of organizing the activities of an extremist organization (Part 1 of Article 282.2 of the Criminal Code). It is known about searches in at least seven settlements and about five arrests.
• On April 20, 2017, the Supreme Court recognized the “Administrative Center of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Russia” as an extremist organization, liquidated it and banned its activities in Russia. In August, all Jehovah's Witnesses organizations were added to the list of prohibited organizations. After this, a stream of criminal cases against representatives of the confession began. In February 2019, the court handed down its first sentence with real imprisonment - Danish citizen Dennis Christensen was sentenced to six years in prison.
• In February 2019, mass searches took place in the homes of followers of Jehovah's Witnesses in Surgut. At least seven of them reported beatings, humiliation and electric shocks. OVD-Info published the story of the victims' lawyer.