Magnitsky’s Mother Goes to the Russian Supreme Court to Overturn the Second Posthumous Case Against Her Murdered Son

November 21, 2014

Sergei Magnitsky’s moth­er has filed a com­plaint with the judi­cial col­legium of the Supreme Court of Rus­sia in rela­tion to the sec­ond posthu­mous pro­ceed­ing orga­nized against her son by the Russ­ian Inte­ri­or Ministry.

Under this sec­ond posthu­mous case, Sergei Mag­nit­sky has been named after his death as a “co-con­spir­a­tor” in the $230 mil­lion tax refund fraud that he had in fact uncov­ered and exposed.

“…Inves­ti­ga­tor Urzhumt­sev in vio­la­tion of the prin­ci­ple of pre­sump­tion of inno­cence, in vio­la­tion of the con­sti­tu­tion­al right for defence, in the absence of a court order, in the absence of pre­lim­i­nary inves­ti­ga­tion, had stat­ed in his decree [from Decem­ber 2010] that Sergei Mag­nit­sky who died a year before [in Novem­ber 2009] in Matrosskaya Tishi­na deten­tion cen­ter, com­mit­ted a seri­ous crime… the theft of 5.4 bil­lion rubles [$230 mil­lion]…The con­clu­sion itself must be qual­i­fied as slan­der in rela­tion to know­ing­ly inno­cent per­son,” says the complaint.

 “He [Inves­ti­ga­tor Urzhumt­sev] knew very well, that Mag­nit­sky not only was not com­plic­it in the theft of 5.4 bil­lion rubles, but that Mag­nit­sky was the first per­son who had uncov­ered the crime com­mit­ted against the three com­pa­nies of his client, and who had exposed the crim­i­nal activ­i­ty of per­haps one of the largest crim­i­nal groups which spe­cial­izes in unlaw­ful tax refunds,” says the complaint.

Inte­ri­or Min­istry Inves­ti­ga­tor Oleg Urzhumt­sev was includ­ed on both the inves­tiga­tive team on the case against Sergei Mag­nit­sky under which Mag­nit­sky was arrest­ed and ill-treat­ed in cus­tody; and on the case to inves­ti­gate the $230 mil­lion theft that Mag­nit­sky had uncov­ered. The sec­ond inves­ti­ga­tion led by Inves­ti­ga­tor Urzhumt­sev fin­ished by exon­er­at­ing all Russ­ian Inte­ri­or Min­istry and tax offi­cials from lia­bil­i­ty for the $230 mil­lion theft, and nam­ing Sergei Mag­nit­sky as co-con­spir­a­tor posthu­mous­ly and in secret from his rel­a­tives. Urzhumt­sev also was respon­si­ble for assign­ing the blame for the crime to a “job­less” per­son named Vyach­eslav Khleb­nikov in a fast-track pro­ceed­ing which end­ed with a lenient sen­tence of five years for the $230 mil­lion theft. As part of that pro­ceed­ing con­duct­ed after Magnitsky’s death, Khleb­nikov gave a false tes­ti­mo­ny against Mag­nit­sky from detention.

“As mem­ber of the inves­tiga­tive group [on the case Sergei Mag­nit­sky was detained], Urzhumt­sev knew that Mag­nit­sky was arrest­ed soon after his tes­ti­mo­ny impli­cat­ing offi­cials in the theft of 5.4 bil­lion rubles, and that some of those offi­cials were includ­ed on the same inves­tiga­tive team,-  points out the com­plaint. — Mag­nit­sky stat­ed that his crim­i­nal pros­e­cu­tion was a mea­sure of repres­sion aimed to pun­ish him for the assis­tance he pro­vid­ed to his client dur­ing the iden­ti­fi­ca­tion of cir­cum­stances of the theft of his client’s com­pa­nies — Rilend, Makhaon, and Par­fe­nion.”

The com­plaint says that Inves­ti­ga­tor Urzhumt­sev has con­cealed the real per­pe­tra­tors by blam­ing the $230 mil­lion theft on Sergei Mag­nit­sky, and two oth­er deceased indi­vid­u­als (Mr Gasanov and Mr Korobeinikov), nei­ther of whom were alive and could be ques­tioned at the time of the investigation.

“The evi­dence in the case file objec­tive­ly demon­strates that Inves­ti­ga­tor Urzhumt­sev act­ed in the inter­ests of per­sons who per­pe­trat­ed the theft of 5.4 bil­lion rubles [$230 mil­lion], and who using his own ter­mi­nol­o­gy, “found” two deceased indi­vid­u­als in order to put on them the lia­bil­i­ty for the theft of bud­get funds, and in order to pro­vide the ser­vice of con­ceal­ment for the real per­pe­tra­tors of the crime,” says the complaint.

It was since uncov­ered that Mr Gasanov died on 1 Octo­ber 2007, two months before the $230 mil­lion was com­mit­ted. Mr Korobeinikov died in Sep­tem­ber 2008, “falling of a bal­cony” of a build­ing under con­struc­tion, accord­ing to the Russ­ian investigation.

Ms Mag­nit­skaya asks the Russ­ian Supreme Court to exam­ine the law­ful­ness of inves­ti­ga­tor Urzhumtsev’s actions and annul pre­vi­ous deci­sions by low­er-lev­el Russ­ian courts who reject­ed her complaints.

“The court must check the law­ful­ness and the jus­ti­fi­ca­tion for the Investigator’s decree… The pre­vi­ous rejec­tion vio­lates the con­sti­tu­tion­al prin­ci­ple of the pre­sump­tion of inno­cence because deceased Mag­nit­sky was named by Inves­ti­ga­tor Urzhumt­sev as a co-con­spir­a­tor in a crime,” says the complaint.

“The court had an oppor­tu­ni­ty to check the argu­ments using the crim­i­nal case files, and by invit­ing inves­ti­ga­tor Urzhumt­sev to give tes­ti­mo­ny, but it failed to do so…As a result, the con­clu­sion of the court [of low­er instance] is not sup­port­ed by the fac­tu­al cir­cum­stances, which is … the ground to can­cel the court deci­sion,” says the com­plaint in conclusion.

Pre­vi­ous com­plaints from Ms Mag­nit­skaya addressed to low­er instance courts have been reject­ed by Moscow dis­trict judge Tatiana Nevero­va, and Moscow city court judges Andrei Titov and Lyubov Ishmuratova.

In the Unit­ed States, 26 Russ­ian offi­cials and pri­vate indi­vid­u­als involved in Sergei Magnitsky’s deten­tion and ill-treat­ment in cus­tody and in the crim­i­nal con­spir­a­cy Mag­nit­sy had uncov­ered have been sanc­tioned under the US Mag­nit­sky Act. The list includes sev­er­al col­leagues of Inves­ti­ga­tor Urzhumt­sev on the Russ­ian Inte­ri­or Ministry’s inves­tiga­tive team in the Mag­nit­sky case.

Sergei Magnitsky’s Mother Slams the Russian Authorities Refusal to Investigate the Murder of Her Son on the 5^th Anniversary of His Death

November 19, 2014

Sergei Magnitsky’s moth­er has spo­ken of the suf­fer­ing she has been sub­ject­ed to in her calls to seek jus­tice for her mur­dered son in Russia.

In an exten­sive inter­view to the Open Rus­sia web­site, Natalia Mag­nit­skaya spoke of her grief of the way that Russ­ian offi­cials have dealt with her complaints.

“All our appli­ca­tions and com­plaints to all gov­ern­ment bod­ies are being reject­ed. I can’t read these rejec­tions any more. It is clear that they are sim­ply mock­ing us. For exam­ple, they sent us mate­ri­als to read, but the copies are so poor it was impos­si­ble to read them. My lawyer filed a com­plaint to the high­er-lev­el body, but his com­plaint was reject­ed. They said essen­tial­ly that all is ok, there is no need for you to read them.”

Natalia Mag­nit­skaya also depict­ed her anguish at the lies offi­cial­ly issued by the Russ­ian Gen­er­al Prosecutor’s Office, which jus­ti­fied the posthu­mous tri­al of her son by claim­ing that the fam­i­ly had asked for it:

“Recent­ly, one of the doc­u­ments from the Gen­er­al Prosecutor’s Office said that they had ini­ti­at­ed the case against Mag­nit­sky on the request from his moth­er. But we had stat­ed in writ­ing on so many occa­sions that we do not want the posthu­mous pros­e­cu­tion. Howcouldthisbe?”

Natalia Mag­nit­skaya described the strug­gle to seek jus­tice for her son in Rus­sia as “fac­ing a wall,” but said she con­tin­ues to chal­lenge the rejec­tions nev­er­the­less and seek jus­tice and is not pre­pared to give up:

“So far every­thing has been with­out effect. In spite of this we try to chal­lenge every­thing, but it gives you the feel­ing that you are fac­ing a wall…But we should not stop…It is impos­si­ble to give in.”

In anoth­er report on the Open Rus­sia web­site in mem­o­ry of Sergei Mag­nit­sky, Russ­ian jour­nal­ist and human rights activist Zoya Sve­to­va recalled how she and oth­er mem­bers of the Moscow Pub­lic Over­sight Com­mis­sion inves­ti­gat­ed the cir­cum­stances of his mur­der in detention.

“We wrote a report and sent it on 31 Decem­ber 2009 to the Pres­i­dent of Rus­sia, the Gen­er­al Prosecutor’s Office and the Min­istry of Jus­tice. In our report, we wrote that we do not trust the tes­ti­mo­ny of deten­tion offi­cials and are con­vinced that the right to life of Mag­nit­sky was vio­lat­ed. In oth­er words, the lawyer was murdered.” 

Also on the Open Rus­sia web­site, Russ­ian play­wright Ele­na Grem­i­na, author of the play, “One Hour Eigh­teen Min­utes,” which depicts the last hours of Sergei Magnitsky’s life, spoke of how work­ing with the Mag­nit­sky sto­ry changed her and those who worked on the play with her:

“It was decid­ed, as usu­al­ly hap­pens with new ideas, to gath­er doc­u­ments and mate­ri­als about Sergei Mag­nit­sky to see if his sto­ry had poten­tial for a play. I did not know then that the gath­er­ing of mate­ri­als for this prospec­tive play would change us, would intro­duce us to new ideas and new peo­ple, that it would change a lot in me.”

Mate­ri­als to Com­mem­o­rate the 5^th Anniver­sary of Sergei Magnitsky’s Killing in Cus­tody can be found on Open Rus­sia web­site.

Russia is Preparing for a Showdown at Interpol to Seek the Arrest of William Browder – CEO of Hermitage Capital & Leader of Magnitsky Justice Campaign for the 3^rd time

November 17, 2014

As the world marks the fifth anniver­sary of the mur­der in Russ­ian police cus­tody of Her­mitage Capital’s lawyer, Sergei Mag­nit­sky, the Russ­ian gov­ern­ment is push­ing Inter­pol to arrest William Brow­der, CEO of Her­mitage and leader of the Mag­nit­sky Jus­tice campaign.

The deci­sion on Mr Brow­der will be a test case for the new lead­er­ship at Inter­pol.  Mr Jür­gen Stock from the Ger­man Fed­er­al Crim­i­nal Police was elect­ed on 7 Novem­ber 2014 as Interpol’s new Gen­er­al Sec­re­tary, replac­ing US rep­re­sen­ta­tive Ron Noble (http://www.interpol.int/About-INTERPOL/Structure-and-governance/J%C3%BCrgen-Stock), and for­mer Croa­t­ian judge Nina Vajić was appoint­ed as chair to Inter­pol’s Com­mis­sion for Con­trol of Files in Sep­tem­ber 2014, replac­ing for­mer Irish Data Pro­tec­tion Com­mis­sion­er Bil­ly Hawkes (http://www.interpol.int/News-and-media/News/2014/N2014-165).

Inter­pol’s Com­mis­sion for Con­trol of Files will be decid­ing on the Russ­ian government’s third Red Notice appli­ca­tion for Brow­der at the meet­ing on Novem­ber 20^th - 21^st 2014 at the Inter­pol head­quar­ters in Lyon. The Inter­pol Com­mis­sion reject­ed Russia’s pre­vi­ous two appli­ca­tions for Brow­der as “pre­dom­i­nant­ly polit­i­cal” and con­trary to Interpol’s Constitution.

“Rus­sia has clear­ly dis­re­gard­ed Interpol’s two pre­vi­ous deci­sions on Mr Browder’s case as polit­i­cal, and con­tin­ues to press Inter­pol on the basis of a bar­bar­ic posthu­mous tri­al and doc­u­ments pre­pared by Russ­ian offi­cials in the Mag­nit­sky case who have been sanc­tioned in the West,” said a Her­mitage Cap­i­tal representative.

The Brow­der-led Mag­nit­sky jus­tice cam­paign has been cred­it­ed with suc­cess­ful­ly impos­ing US visa and finan­cial sanc­tions on Russ­ian Inte­ri­or Min­istry offi­cials and judges respon­si­ble for Sergei Magnitsky’s arrest, ill-treat­ment and death in custody.

Now Rus­sia is press­ing Inter­pol to arrest Mr Brow­der on the basis of the Russ­ian case orga­nized by those same sanc­tioned Russ­ian Inte­ri­or Min­istry offi­cials and judges. The case has been ongo­ing for many years, and has been high­light­ed by the Coun­cil of Europe as emblem­at­ic of polit­i­cal­ly moti­vat­ed abus­es of the jus­tice sys­tem in Russia.

Rus­si­a’s third request to Inter­pol for Brow­der’s arrest is based on that same case, which cul­mi­nat­ed last year in Rus­sia with the con­vic­tions of Sergei Mag­nit­sky posthu­mous­ly and Mr Brow­der in absen­tia as “co-con­spir­a­tors” in the first-ever posthu­mous tri­al in Russ­ian his­to­ry.  It is only the sec­ond posthu­mous tri­al in Euro­pean his­to­ry, since the 897 Cadav­er Syn­od when Pope For­mo­sus’ remains were dug out of the ground to face charges after a ver­dict by Pope Stephen VI that the deceased had been unwor­thy of the pontificate.

Today’s equiv­a­lent of Pope Stephen VI is Russ­ian judge Igor Alisov. He presided over the posthu­mous tri­al of Sergei Mag­nit­sky and in absen­tia tri­al against Brow­der in July 2013, and one month lat­er he was pro­mot­ed by Russia’s Pres­i­dent Vladimir Putin.  In May 2014, Judge Alisov was placed on the Mag­nit­sky sanc­tions list by the US Government.

Judge Ele­na Stashina is anoth­er Russ­ian judge involved in the posthumous/in absen­tia pro­ceed­ings against Mag­nit­sky and Brow­der. Under the same case, she signed the arrest war­rant for Mr Brow­der and ear­li­er for Mr Mag­nit­sky. Serv­ing as the Tver­skoi dis­trict judge in Moscow when Sergei Mag­nit­sky was alive, she reject­ed his com­plaints about cru­el treat­ment and vio­la­tions of his rights, and extend­ed his deten­tion with­out tri­al just four days before he was killed.

Judge Stashina has also been sanc­tioned by the US Gov­ern­ment under the “Sergei Mag­nit­sky Rule of Law Account­abil­i­ty Act of 2012.”

This week it will be up to Interpol’s Com­mis­sion, led by Ms Vajic with four spe­cial­ists from Cana­da, France, Turkey, and Mau­ri­tius, to decide whether to uphold Interpol’s two pre­vi­ous rejec­tions of the Russ­ian request, or to approve the request, using the posthu­mous tri­al as the basis for that change in posi­tion.  The lat­est Russ­ian request forms part of the Russ­ian state’s polit­i­cal attack against Mr Brow­der, which has been ongo­ing for sev­er­al years.

Statement by Bill Browder on 5^th Anniversary of Sergei Magnitsky’s Killing in Russia

November 16, 2014

Dear Friends and supporters,

 Today marks the 5^th anniver­sary of Sergei Mag­nit­sky’s killing in Russ­ian police custody. 

Sergei was my lawyer who was mur­dered because he exposed one of the largest gov­ern­ment cor­rup­tion schemes in Russ­ian his­to­ry. After he tes­ti­fied against the police offi­cers involved, he was arrest­ed by the same offi­cers and was then sys­tem­at­i­cal­ly tor­tured for 358 days. On Novem­ber 16, 2009 he went into crit­i­cal con­di­tion and instead of being treat­ed, he was put in an iso­la­tion cell and beat­en by eight riot guards with rub­ber batons until he was dead at the age of 37.

When I learned of Sergei’s death, it was the worst news I had ever received in my life. It was like a knife going into my heart and I made a vow to myself, his fam­i­ly and his mem­o­ry that I would get jus­tice for him. For five years, I have tried to get that jus­tice, but the Russ­ian gov­ern­ment has used every tool at their dis­pos­al to thwart me. They claimed Sergei was nev­er tor­tured and he died of nat­ur­al caus­es. They claimed that he nev­er uncov­ered or exposed a crime, but was the one guilty of one. And most shock­ing­ly, they exon­er­at­ed every sin­gle Russ­ian state employ­ee involved in spite of a moun­tain of doc­u­men­tary evi­dence to the contrary.

 It became clear to me that there was no pos­si­bil­i­ty of jus­tice inside of Rus­sia so I sought jus­tice out­side of Rus­sia and have advo­cat­ed for sanc­tions against the peo­ple who killed Sergei in many coun­tries in the West. Three years after Sergei’s death, the US gov­ern­ment signed the Sergei Mag­nit­sky Rule of Law Account­abil­i­ty Act impos­ing visa sanc­tions and asset freezes on those involved in Sergei’s death as well as oth­er human rights vio­la­tions. Sim­i­lar sanc­tions are being con­sid­ered by gov­ern­ments in Europe as well.

 Putin and his gov­ern­ment have become infu­ri­at­ed at the glob­al reac­tion to Sergei’s case and have lashed out in all sorts of ways. Short­ly after the Mag­nit­sky Act was passed, Putin banned US adop­tions of dis­abled Russ­ian chil­dren. In 2013, more than three years after Sergei died, they put him on tri­al in the first ever posthu­mous tri­al in the his­to­ry of Rus­sia. They also put me on tri­al in absen­tia as his co-defen­dant and sen­tenced me to nine years.

 When I first start­ed this cam­paign, many peo­ple thought that what hap­pened to Sergei was some kind of anom­aly. They said “this is a sad sto­ry, but prob­a­bly a one-off”, but as time has gone by, more and more cas­es like this have sur­faced and it’s becom­ing obvi­ous to every­one that Rus­sia is a crim­i­nal state tak­ing inno­cent peo­ple hostage and doing hor­rif­ic things to them. The most recent actions in Ukraine make it clear to even the most ardent Russ­ian apol­o­gists that Rus­sia is engag­ing in all sorts of atroc­i­ties and brazen­ly cov­er­ing them up.

What hap­pened to Sergei is now a glob­al sym­bol of every­thing that is wrong with Rus­sia, from the actu­al crime of what they did to Sergei to the high lev­el cov­er-up to the threats against me and oth­ers seek­ing jus­tice. Despite the many hor­rif­ic threats and all the mis­in­for­ma­tion Rus­sia is spew­ing out in this case, I won’t back down in my call for jus­tice for Sergei Mag­nit­sky and nei­ther will those close to him.  We will not stop until the peo­ple who tor­tured and killed Sergei are prop­er­ly brought to justice.

Thank you for your con­tin­ued sup­port on this impor­tant mission.

Two Minute Tribute Song on YouTube to Mark 5^th Anniversary of Sergei Magnitsky’s Murder in Russian Police Custody

November 16, 2014

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To com­mem­o­rate the fifth anniver­sary of Sergei Mag­nit­sky’s death in Russ­ian police cus­tody, please join us by watch­ing a short song on YouTube devot­ed to Sergei’s life and his sac­ri­fice (LINK to Song).

Sergei Mag­nit­sky was a 37-year old Russ­ian anti-cor­rup­tion lawyer who uncov­ered a $230 mil­lion fraud per­pe­trat­ed by Russ­ian gov­ern­ment offi­cials and organ­ised crim­i­nals. After he impli­cat­ed Russ­ian police offi­cers in the crime, he was arrest­ed by the very same offi­cers, tor­tured and bru­tal­ly killed at Matrosskaya Tishi­na pre-tri­al deten­tion cen­ter in Moscow on 16 Novem­ber 2009.

The Mag­nit­sky music video goes on to show poignant images of Rus­sians protest­ing against the impuni­ty in the Mag­nit­sky case car­ry­ing posters: “Fight­ing Cor­rup­tion Can Kill”; “Putin is not Rus­sia”, “Our Free­dom Can’t Be Tak­en Away”, “I Will Fight for My Rights.”

 

The video con­cludes with a pho­to of Sergei on hol­i­day with his friends and the by-line: “Russ­ian hero.”

While the killing of Sergei Mag­nit­sky has ignit­ed world­wide con­dem­na­tion and lead to numer­ous polit­i­cal and legal calls for jus­tice around the globe, five years on there has still been no jus­tice for Sergei Mag­nit­sky in Rus­sia. Instead, he him­self was posthu­mous­ly pros­e­cut­ed in the first posthu­mous tri­al in the his­to­ry of Rus­sia, with the judge pre­sid­ing at the tri­al imme­di­ate­ly pro­mot­ed by Russ­ian Pres­i­dent Vladimir Putin. The Russ­ian author­i­ties also last year closed the inves­ti­ga­tion into his death find­ing “no sign of crime,” and refused all appli­ca­tions from Sergei Magnitsky’s moth­er to reopen the inves­ti­ga­tion into the evi­dence of his tor­ture and murder.

On Fri­day, the US State Depart­ment released a state­ment on the eve of the fifth anniver­sary of Sergei Magnitsky’s death which says:

“Despite wide­ly-pub­li­cized, cred­i­ble evi­dence of crim­i­nal con­duct result­ing in Magnitskiy’s death, Russ­ian author­i­ties have failed to bring to jus­tice those respon­si­ble. We remain con­cerned about impuni­ty for this crime and the atmos­phere of intim­i­da­tion for those who work to uncov­er cor­rup­tion or human rights abus­es in the Russ­ian Fed­er­a­tion. On the fifth anniver­sary of Magnitskiy’s death, we con­tin­ue to call for full account­abil­i­ty for those respon­si­ble for his unjust impris­on­ment and wrong­ful death and we will con­tin­ue to ful­ly sup­port the efforts of those in Rus­sia who seek to bring these indi­vid­u­als to jus­tice, includ­ing through imple­men­ta­tion of the Sergei Mag­nit­sky Rule of Law Account­abil­i­ty Act of 2012.” (http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2014/11/234094.htm)

Sergei Mag­nit­sky’s case and the impuni­ty of the Russ­ian offi­cials involved have become a sym­bol of the cor­rup­tion and fail­ing jus­tice sys­tem in Rus­sia, and of the abuse of the rights of its cit­i­zens who chal­lenge the authorities.

The Sergei Mag­nit­sky trib­ute song was writ­ten by a song­writer Samuel Smith, and record­ed as a result of a request made on www.movements.org, a crowd-sourc­ing plat­form for human rights activists around the world. The video direct­ed by Alexan­dra Agee­va has been cre­at­ed by Russ­ian civic rights activists, includ­ing Pussy Riot, who con­duct­ed a series of one-per­son protest actions around Moscow this summer.

Trib­ute to Sergei Mag­nit­sky five years after his death by Russ­ian civ­il soci­ety activists

Tweet and pass along (LINK to Song)

Soft­ly spo­ken, words bleed the truth
And help dis­cov­er the bro­ken and confused
The fight for jus­tice and the path of one man
Bring new begin­nings and take down cor­rupt plans

Sergei,
You can’t pass away from the peo­ple who know
Sergei,
Your words lead the way for the world to go

You didn’t lose your life in vain
Every­one on Earth will remem­ber the name
Sergei,
Every­one on Earth will remem­ber the name

Jailed for the words that he spoke
His name lives on
In the name of the music and the folks
Who fail to for­get that rulers need
To show respect to the peo­ple they lead

Sergei,
You can’t pass away from the peo­ple who know
Sergei,
Your words lead the way for the world to go

You didn’t lose your life in vain -
Every­one on Earth will remem­ber the name
Sergei,
Every­one on Earth will remem­ber the name
Sergei
Sergei

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