Moscow City Bar Association Condemns the Persecution of the Hermitage Fund Lawyers Who Had Exposed Corruption, Calls Upon General Prosecutor to Open a Criminal Case Against Responsible Officials

July 5, 2010

The Moscow City Bar Asso­ci­a­tion has con­demned the sys­tem­at­ic per­se­cu­tion of Russ­ian lawyers of the Her­mitage Fund who had report­ed state offi­cials involved in the theft of $230 mil­lion of bud­get funds and has called upon the Russ­ian Gen­er­al Pros­e­cu­tor Yuri Chai­ka to open a crim­i­nal case against those offi­cials. The peti­tion is signed by Gen­ri Reznik, head of the Moscow City Bar Asso­ci­a­tion, and Robert Zinoviev, Head of the Com­mis­sion for the Sup­port of the Pro­fes­sion­al and Social Rights of Lawyers (see text in Russ­ian at: http://www.advokatymoscow.ru/legal_regulation/apm_dokuments/zashita_advokatov_doc/hayretdinov/to_chayka.php).

The Moscow City Bar Asso­ci­a­tion in par­tic­u­lar has called the atten­tion of the Russ­ian Gen­er­al Pros­e­cu­tor to the “crim­i­nal actions by Artem Kuznetsov, an employ­ee of the Tax Crimes Depart­ment of the Moscow Branch of the Inte­ri­or Min­istry, who appears to have been com­plic­it in the per­pe­tra­tion of the crim­i­nal scheme to embez­zle 5.4 bil­lion rubles [$230 mil­lion] of bud­get funds and, despite this, was cho­sen to pro­vide oper­a­tional sup­port into the inves­ti­ga­tion of the crime.”

The Moscow City Bar Asso­ci­a­tion has also con­demned actions by Inves­ti­ga­tor Gordievsky from the Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee of the Prosecutor’s Office who unlaw­ful­ly pros­e­cut­ed the Moscow lawyers rep­re­sent­ing the Her­mitage Fund, Eduard Khairet­di­nov and Vladimir Pas­tukhov, imme­di­ate­ly after they report­ed the role of offi­cials in the theft of $230 mil­lion of bud­get funds. Messrs Reznik and Zinoviev exposed the spu­ri­ous grounds used by this offi­cial to intim­i­date the lawyers with crim­i­nal prosecution.

The Moscow City Bar Asso­ci­a­tion has high­light­ed unlaw­ful actions against lawyers by anoth­er offi­cial, Inves­ti­ga­tor Oleg Silchenko of the Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee of the Inte­ri­or Min­istry. Messrs Reznik and Zinoviev describe how he “used dirty and ille­gal meth­ods to obstruct the lawyers’ work” in an attempt to intim­i­date anoth­er Her­mitage lawyer, Alexan­der Antipov. Inves­ti­ga­tor Silchenko had tried to dis­bar Mr Antipov on an appar­ent false ground. Messrs Reznik and Zinoviev state that Inves­ti­ga­tor Silchenko’s actions were intend­ed to “obstruct the lawyer’s pro­fes­sion­al activ­i­ty” and con­sti­tut­ed crimes under the Russ­ian Crim­i­nal Code, includ­ing “fraud in office” and “fal­si­fi­ca­tion of evidence.”

In its peti­tion to Chai­ka, the Moscow City Bar Asso­ci­a­tion has reit­er­at­ed its firm sup­port for “our col­leagues who had the courage to pub­licly report the facts of the theft by law enforce­ment offi­cials of over 5.4 bil­lion rubles [$230 mil­lion] of bud­get funds that they uncov­ered in the course of pro­vid­ing legal assis­tance” to their client, the Her­mitage Fund.

Messrs Reznik and Zinoviev remind Mr Chai­ka that two years ago the Moscow legal com­mu­ni­ty already applied to the Gen­er­al Prosecutor’s Office out­lin­ing “the theft of [$230 mil­lion in] bud­get funds,” “the appar­ent lack of inter­est in iden­ti­fy­ing the true per­pe­tra­tors of the theft and oth­er gross vio­la­tions of the fed­er­al law” by offi­cials from the Inte­ri­or Min­istry and the Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee of the Prosecutor’s Office. The Moscow legal com­mu­ni­ty then demand­ed “an urgent, prin­ci­pled, actu­al and effec­tive pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al response.”

Despite this ear­li­er com­plaint filed by the Moscow legal com­mu­ni­ty, the “per­pe­tra­tors of the theft of bud­get funds have remained unpun­ished, while the lawyers who attempt­ed to report them have been sub­ject­ed to a crim­i­nal pros­e­cu­tion,” say Messrs Reznik and Zinoviev.

In con­clu­sion, the Moscow City Bar Asso­ci­a­tion has request­ed that Gen­er­al Pros­e­cu­tor Chai­ka “orga­nize a thor­ough and effec­tive probe and take mea­sures in response up to pros­e­cut­ing the indi­vid­u­als” involved in the theft of bud­get funds and the ille­gal attacks on lawyers and oth­ers who report­ed the actions of the cor­rupt offi­cials to the authorities.

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