On September 28, the European Court of Human Rights awarded compensation to Viktor Filinkov and Dmitry Pchelintsev, convicted in the case of the terrorist community “Network,” as well as Ilya Kapustin, a witness in the case. Mediazona drew attention to the solutions.
Filinkov, a defendant in the “St. Petersburg” Network case, was awarded compensation in the amount of 26 thousand euros, and Kapustin - 52 thousand euros, since their rights to freedom and personal integrity were violated (paragraphs 1 and 2 of Article 5 of the European Convention on the Protection of human rights). In Filinkov’s case, the court also found a violation of his right to a fair trial (Article 6(1) of the European Convention on Human Rights).
Pchelintsev, convicted in the Penza “Network” case, was awarded 26 thousand euros, since the Russian authorities violated his right not to be subjected to torture and inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment (Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights). The court also found a violation of the same article in relation to Filinkov and Kapustin.
Filinkov reported that he was subjected to torture after his arrest on January 24, 2018. Representatives of the Public Monitoring Commission later recorded numerous traces of burns from a stun gun in the chest area, as well as across the entire surface of the right thigh, and a hematoma on the right ankle. According to Filinkov, he was struck with a stun gun immediately after his arrest at Pulkovo airport. From there he was taken to the Krasnogvardeisky district police department, and then to hospital No. 26. From the hospital, Filinkov was taken to the forest, where masked people beat him for five hours. During the beating, FSB officers demanded that he give a confession, and after he gave his consent, they extracted from him the exact wording that he was forced to memorize. Filinkov was threatened that if he refused, this beating would turn out to be “an easy version of what would happen.”
Pchelintsev said that he was repeatedly tortured in a pre-trial detention center: they hung him upside down, connected an electric current to different parts of his body. Thus, they also obtained a confession from him.
Kapustin said that on January 25, 2018, he was attacked by FSB officers unknown to him, knocked to the ground, beaten, dragged into a minibus, handcuffed and given electric shocks for several hours, trying to get the necessary testimony from him. They lifted up Kapustin’s clothes, exposing his stomach, groin and thighs - they shocked him there and hit him several times in the area of the penis. Questions were asked about people whom Kapustin knew and about people he did not know. After three hours of torture, one of the law enforcement officers said that they could break Kapustin’s legs and throw him out in the forest.
- In February 2020, Dmitry Pchelintsev was sentenced to 18 years in a maximum security colony, this is the longest term among all defendants in the Network case. The investigation considered him an organizer of a terrorist community (Part 1 of Article 205.4 of the Criminal Code), and also found him guilty of possession of weapons (Part 1 of Article 222 of the Criminal Code).
- In the summer of 2020, Viktor Filinkov was found guilty of participation in the activities of a terrorist community (Part 2 of Article 205.4 of the Criminal Code) and sentenced to seven years in a general regime colony.
- A criminal case about the “terrorist community “Network”” was opened in October 2017: according to the FSB, 11 young people in Penza and St. Petersburg were planning to overthrow the government. According to the security forces and the court, the young people participated in an organization called “Network,” which allegedly has cells in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Penza and Belarus. Its members allegedly planned to start an armed rebellion. The defendants in the case alleged psychological pressure, electric shock, beatings and planted weapons. Some of them retracted the confessions they gave in the first days after the arrests. In 2019 and 2020, defendants in the case from Penza and St. Petersburg were sentenced to terms ranging from 3.5 to 18 years in prison.