State Persecution of Magnitsky Family Continues: Interior Ministry Removes Family Lawyer and Appoints State Lawyer Against Their Will

January 24, 2012

The moth­er of Sergei Mag­nit­sky, had her fam­i­ly lawyer, Niko­lai Gorokhov, forcibly removed from his role by the Russ­ian Inte­ri­or Min­istry. She has been assigned a new lawyer appoint­ed by state inves­ti­ga­tors against her will. Sergei Magnitsky’s moth­er has asked all Russ­ian lawyers not to col­lab­o­rate with the state inves­ti­ga­tors respon­si­ble for the tor­ture and mur­der of her son. 

In a writ­ten appeal filed with, Hen­ri Reznik, the Pres­i­dent of the Moscow Bar Asso­ci­a­tion against the forced removal of her lawyer by the Inte­ri­or Min­istry, Natalia Mag­nit­skaya said:

“I have engaged my lawyer Niko­lai Gorokhov to pro­vide me with qual­i­fied legal coun­sel and I have full con­fi­dence in his advice. I cat­e­gor­i­cal­ly refuse to accept ser­vices of unknown lawyers appoint­ed by inves­ti­ga­tors with con­flict of inter­est and who have shown their par­tial­i­ty and are act­ing against the law and conscience.”

Lawyer Niko­lai Gorokhov, who rep­re­sents the fam­i­ly, pre­vi­ous­ly chal­lenged the reopen­ing of the ille­gal crim­i­nal case against Sergei Mag­nit­sky 20 months after he died as uncon­sti­tu­tion­al. He has also filed dozens of com­plaints with the Russ­ian Inte­ri­or Min­istry, Russ­ian Gen­er­al Pros­e­cu­tor and the Moscow courts to get jus­tice for the Mag­nit­sky fam­i­ly. He was recog­nised as the sec­ond most influ­en­tial lawyer in Rus­sia by the Expert mag­a­zine for his relent­less cam­paign on behalf of the fam­i­ly last year.

“Niko­lai Gorokhov, has become so effec­tive lay­ing bare the legal absur­di­ties of the posthu­mous per­se­cu­tion of Sergei Mag­nit­sky that the Russ­ian law enforce­ment author­i­ties saw their only way out was to remove him even if there is no legal basis for doing so,” said a Her­mitage Cap­i­tal spokesperson.

William Brow­der, CEO of Her­mitage Cap­i­tal, has con­demned this lat­est devel­op­ment as an act of bla­tant pres­sure on the victim’s fam­i­ly. Mr Brow­der was tes­ti­fy­ing in Stras­bourg in front of the Par­lia­men­tary Assem­bly of the Coun­cil of Europe yesterday. 

William Brow­der said:

“The ille­gal removal of Mag­nit­sky’s fam­i­ly lawyer and the appoint­ment of state lawyer against the fam­i­ly’s will clear­ly vio­lates the legit­i­mate rights and inter­ests of the fam­i­ly. Any­one tak­ing on this role will be involved in fur­ther­ing the con­spir­a­cy and cov­er-up of the tor­ture and mur­der of Sergei Magnitsky”.

Peter Omtzigt, Dutch MP and rep­re­sen­ta­tive of the Coun­cil of Europe, said:

“The Russ­ian gov­ern­ment signed up to the prin­ci­ples of the Coun­cil of Europe. They have a duty not to tor­ture and kill peo­ple who blow the whis­tle on state cor­rup­tion, and an even big­ger duty not to obstruct jus­tice by forcibly remov­ing lawyers who are seek­ing jus­tice for the Mag­nit­sky fam­i­ly. I know I speak for many of my par­lia­men­tary col­leagues when I say that we will not let this atroc­i­ty go unpunished.”

The news about the appoint­ment of state lawyer to the Mag­nit­sky fam­i­ly came from Inves­ti­ga­tor Boris Kibis of the Russ­ian Inte­ri­or Min­istry who sent a telegram to the Moscow Bar Asso­ci­a­tion last Fri­day instruct­ing the Bar Asso­ci­a­tion to appoint a new lawyer for the Mag­nit­sky fam­i­ly. Kibis is the same Inte­ri­or Min­istry inves­ti­ga­tor who for­mal­ly reject­ed the find­ings of the Russ­ian President’s Human Rights Coun­cil that Sergei Mag­nit­sky had been false­ly arrest­ed, tor­tured and killed in cus­tody by offi­cials who he tes­ti­fied against. 

The Moscow-based lawyer Ele­na Khokhobaya has been invit­ed as an “appoint­ed coun­sel” to Mrs Mag­nit­skaya against her will. 

In response, Mrs Natalia Mag­nit­skaya said in her appeal to the Moscow Bar Association:

“I refuse to accept coun­sel from Ele­na Khokhobaya, whom I per­son­al­ly do not know, and with all due respect to her pro­fes­sion, is a stranger to me and I do not trust her for that reason.”

“The appoint­ment by the Russ­ian Inte­ri­or Min­istry of unknown lawyers to rep­re­sent the Mag­nit­sky fam­i­ly and the exclu­sion of the lawyers who have pre­vi­ous­ly chal­lenged the Inte­ri­or Min­istry actions in this case vio­lates the basic right of the victim’s fam­i­ly to receive qual­i­fied legal coun­sel enshrined in Arti­cle 48 of the Russ­ian Con­sti­tu­tion. It is also in breach of Russia’s oblig­a­tion under Arti­cle 16 of the UN Basic Prin­ci­ples On the Role of Lawyers, which requires the gov­ern­ment to pro­tect lawyers from intim­i­da­tion, hin­drance and improp­er inter­fer­ence,” said Mr Browder.

Arti­cle 16 of the UN Prin­ci­ples on the Role of Lawyers says:

“Gov­ern­ments shall ensure that lawyers are able to per­form all of their pro­fes­sion­al func­tions with­out intim­i­da­tion, hin­drance, harass­ment or improp­er interference.”

Dur­ing four seper­ate ses­sions of the Coun­cil of Europe in Stras­bourg yes­ter­day, Mr Brow­der tes­ti­fied about the details of the Russ­ian gov­ern­men­t’s cov­er-up of Magnitsky’s tor­ture and mur­der. Mr Brow­der also described the pres­sure exert­ed by the Russ­ian law enforce­ment author­i­ties on Sergei Mag­nit­sky’s fam­i­ly in the last six months, which has now cul­mi­nat­ed in the exclu­sion of their fam­i­ly-appoint­ed lawyer against their will. 

In his report to the Coun­cil of Europe, Brow­der pre­sent­ed the litany of denials by the Russ­ian Gen­er­al Pros­e­cu­tor’s Office, the Russ­ian Inte­ri­or Min­istry and the courts of Mag­nit­sky’s fam­i­ly com­plaints about the ille­gal actions of state offi­cials. He also described the con­tin­u­ing impuni­ty of 60 offi­cials described as com­plic­it in Mag­nit­sky’s death by the US Helsin­ki Commission.

The per­se­cu­tion of rel­a­tives of Sergei Mag­nit­sky, and now their lawyers, began imme­di­ate­ly after the pub­li­ca­tion of the find­ings of the Human Rights Coun­cil under the Pres­i­dent of Russ­ian Fed­er­a­tion. The Human Rights Coun­cil rec­og­nized the ille­gal­i­ty of the arrest and pros­e­cu­tion of Mag­nit­sky, and revealed the involve­ment of Russ­ian law enforce­ment offi­cials and tax offi­cials in the theft of $230 mil­lion of Russ­ian state funds.

Copies of the com­plaints from Mag­nit­sky rel­a­tives against the appoint­ment of unknown lawyers were sent yes­ter­day to the Pros­e­cu­tor Gen­er­al Chai­ka, Chief of the Inves­tiga­tive Depart­ment of the Inte­ri­or Min­istry Kozhokar and Chief of the Inte­ri­or Depart­ment for the Cen­tral Fed­er­al Dis­trict Solovyov.

In Octo­ber last year, more than 50 mem­bers of the Coun­cil of Europe from 28 coun­tries signed the “Mag­nit­sky Dec­la­ra­tion” which demand­ed that the Russ­ian gov­ern­ment pro­tect the Mag­nit­sky fam­i­ly from Inte­ri­or Min­istry persecution.

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