Magnitsky’s Mother Appeals to Moscow Bar Association For All Lawyers To Boycott the Posthumous Trial of Her Son

January 15, 2013

Sergei Mag­nit­sky’s moth­er has appealed to Hen­ry Reznik, the Chair­man of the Moscow City Bar, and through him to all mem­bers of the Moscow Bar to not par­tic­i­pate as ” state appoint­ed coun­sel” in the posthu­mous tri­al of her son. She made her request in a for­mal appli­ca­tion filed with the Moscow Bar Association.
“I regard par­tic­i­pa­tion in this unlaw­ful action as coop­er­a­tion with the vio­la­tors of the law and human rights, and as aid­ing in the com­mis­sion of a crime against my son,” said Natalia Magnitsky.

A pre­lim­i­nary hear­ing is sched­uled for Jan­u­ary 28, 2013 in the posthu­mous tri­al of Sergei Mag­nit­sky at the Tver­skoi Dis­trict Court of Moscow. Judge Igor Alisov will be chair­ing the tri­al. Ms Mag­nit­sky and her lawyer will not par­tic­i­pate in the tri­al after hav­ing filed more than 25 appeals seek­ing to stop the tri­al point­ing out that it breach­es the con­sti­tu­tion­al rights of Mr Mag­nit­sky and his fam­i­ly. The Russ­ian author­i­ties have refused all the family’s peti­tions and threat­ened to appoint a new lawyer to rep­re­sent Ms Mag­nit­sky against her will if the fam­i­ly lawyer does not attend the trial.

“Nei­ther I, nor any oth­er rel­a­tives of my son intend to par­tic­i­pate in this act being orches­trat­ed in the Tver­skoi Dis­trict Court of Moscow… A lawyer who may be asked [by author­i­ties] to appear at the hear­ing may not be aware of the cir­cum­stances of the case and may not real­ize the unlaw­ful­ness of the posthu­mous pros­e­cu­tion of my son. How­ev­er, his pres­ence will allow the court to indi­cate the absence of vio­la­tions of the right to defence, and thus through his pres­ence the lawyer will serve as an unwit­ting accom­plice to this crime,” Magnitsky’s moth­er said in her statement.

“With the help of my son, the crimes of per­sons occu­py­ing high posi­tions were exposed, and because of these crimes, they have become enor­mous­ly rich. These indi­vid­u­als, espe­cial­ly at the present time, are inter­est­ed to com­pro­mise my son. With this pur­pose, they orga­nized this posthu­mous pros­e­cu­tion in order to obtain a know­ing­ly unjust judg­ment and posthu­mous­ly defame the hon­est name of my son,” said Natalia Magnitsky.

“Deputy Pros­e­cu­tor of Rus­sia Gen­er­al Vik­tor Grin, clear­ly act­ing in the inter­ests of per­sons exposed by my son and for which expo­sure he had paid with his own life, reversed the deci­sion to dis­con­tin­ue the crim­i­nal pro­ceed­ing against him, cyn­i­cal­ly exploit­ing the Con­sti­tu­tion­al Court rul­ing… The right to seek the open­ing of a pre­vi­ous­ly dis­con­tin­ued crim­i­nal pro­ceed­ing belongs exclu­sive­ly to close rel­a­tives. Nei­ther I nor any of the close rel­a­tives of my son have asked the law enforce­ment author­i­ties to resume the pro­ceed­ing,” said Ms Mag­nit­sky in her appeal to Moscow lawyers.

“That is why I found it nec­es­sary to speak direct­ly to you per­son­al­ly in order to warn you, and through you, the lawyers of the Moscow City Bar,” said Natalia Mag­nit­sky to Hen­ry Reznik, Chair­man of the Moscow Bar Association.

“My son died in cus­tody as a result of an unlaw­ful crim­i­nal pros­e­cu­tion orga­nized against him in retal­i­a­tion for his role in expos­ing a group of offi­cials, who for years stole from the bud­get bil­lions of rou­bles under the guise of tax refunds … The reopen­ing of a pros­e­cu­tion against my dead son with­out my con­sent and with­out the con­sent of oth­er close rel­a­tives and against their will, is con­trary to the aims and the legal mean­ing of the judge­ment of the Russ­ian Con­sti­tu­tion­al Court… It dis­torts its legal pur­pose, vio­lates the con­sti­tu­tion­al rights of my son, and espe­cial­ly in light of recent inter­na­tion­al events, is polit­i­cal­ly moti­vat­ed,” said the moth­er of Sergei Mag­nit­sky in her writ­ten state­ment addressed to Moscow lawyers.

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