Remembering Sergei Magnitsky

November 18, 2009

Let­ter from the law firm Fire­stone Dun­can to clients and staff regard­ing the death of Sergey Magnitsky
Dear clients, part­ners and friends,

On the night of Novem­ber 17, 2009 we lost our col­league and friend Sergey Mag­nitskey. Sergey was 37.

Sergey died in police cus­tody where he had been held almost a year with­out tri­al or bail. He was held by a group of police offi­cers who he had tes­ti­fied against; a group of offi­cers who we believe com­mit­ted a crime against a client and the Russ­ian State.

Sergey died because he would not coop­er­ate with crim­i­nals. He was repeat­ed­ly told that if he gave false tes­ti­mo­ny against his client he would be released and he refused. As time went on his cap­tors put him in ever wors­en­ing con­di­tions as a means of pres­sur­ing him to coop­er­ate. His health dete­ri­o­rat­ed and after being diag­nosed by prison doc­tors as need­ing med­ica­tion and an oper­a­tion, the police then increased the pres­sure on Sergey by deny­ing him med­ical treatment.
We knew that Sergey was ill and that he was suf­fer­ing. We did not know how bad his con­di­tion was but we did our best to bring his ille­gal deten­tion and his dete­ri­o­rat­ing con­di­tion to the atten­tion of the Russ­ian author­i­ties and we had a lot of help on the way. Despite our efforts and the efforts of many friends, the Russ­ian author­i­ties did not act and Sergey died of a con­di­tion that could have been cured with a sim­ple oper­a­tion and medication.
Many of you knew Sergey pro­fes­sion­al­ly, some of you had the oppor­tu­ni­ty to know him on a more per­son­al level.

Sergey was a remark­able man. Hon­est, decent, kind, and incred­i­bly knowl­edge­able. He had faith in Russ­ian law and in Rus­sia. He had a quite strength of char­ac­ter and in the end he main­tained his integri­ty under impos­si­ble conditions.

There is a cry of shock and out­rage in the press, both in Rus­sia and abroad, and we shall add our voic­es to it. Like Sergey we believe that rule of law is worth fight­ing for and we shall do our best to see that his death has some meaning.

On a more per­son­al lev­el, we have lost a great friend; some­one we all admired and the kind of per­son that Rus­sia needs more of. We will miss him great­ly. Sergey is sur­vived by his moth­er, his wife and his two chil­dren. Their finan­cial needs will be tak­en care of. It is the least we can do for our friend.

Respect­ful­ly,
Fire­stone Duncan

Comments

• Link