Torture shots

Under the guise of the execution of decisions of the ECHR, the State Duma simplified the life of sadists in colonies and prisons

On May 26, the State Duma voted for the adoption of amendments to the Criminal Executive Code, which forbade lawyers to "bring technical means of communication, as well as technical equipment (devices) to the territory of the correctional institution, which allow filming, audio and video recording."

The speed of the bill is amazing. On May 5, the draft amendments were made to the State Duma, and already on May 26 they voted for it and sent for approval to the Federation Council.

Judging by the explanatory note to the bill, formally the amendments were made to respect the European Court of Human Rights. The fact is that the PEC did not provide for the possibility of meeting prisoners with lawyers who are ready to help the convict prepare a complaint in the ECHR. The European Court admitted that this violates Article 34 of the Convention on the Protection of Human Rights and Basic Freedoms. Russia agreed with this and decided to amend the PEC. But under the noise, a ban was born to lawyers to carry mobile phones in the colony and prisons. True, the lawyers were allowed to carry cameras and copying equipment in the colony and prisons with the same correction. But exclusively for copying documents of his customers and "only in the absence of a convicted person in a separate room."

What do these amendments mean in practice?

Lawyers were actually deprived of the opportunity to record traces of the beatings and torture of their customers.

Because it was the photographs of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Bruises and abrasions of the prisoners who often became the grounds for prosecutorial inspections. And the colonies had to come up with versions about the victim, which fell from the shk, slippery floor in the bathhouse, etc.

In fairness, it must be said that much more serious resonance and consequences caused cases of tortures when video and photography made not by lawyers during the dates, but by the employees of the penitentiary system, fell into the public. In 2018, the “New” published the shooting of torture in the Yaroslavl correctional colony No. 1. After this publication, a criminal case was opened, the sadists received real prison terms in uniform.

But this publication had other consequences. It was in 2018 that there was a surge in the number of complaints about violence in colonies and prisons. And the basis of these complaints, as a rule, were precisely photographs of traces of torture and beatings made by lawyers.

Perhaps the Investigative Committee tired of dealing with these statements. And together with the FSIN and State Duma deputies, they found a creative way to reduce the flow of complaints. There will be no photofixions - there will be no statements. It is much easier to prohibit mobile phones in the colony than to eradicate the arbitrariness of sadists.