Head of the Russian State Investigative Committee Refuses to Open an Investigation into the Torture of Sergei Magnitsky, Fears Scrutiny by the “Man in the Street”

March 17, 2011

Cit­ing the “com­plex­i­ty of med­ical issues” which the “man on the street” is unable to com­pre­hend, Alexan­der Bas­trykin, Head of the Russ­ian State Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee, yes­ter­day refused to open an inves­ti­ga­tion into the tor­ture and mur­der of Sergei Mag­nit­sky, a 37-year old lawyer for Her­mitage Fund while in Inte­ri­or Min­istry cus­tody. Mr. Bas­trykin announced this posi­tion at a pub­lic speech in St. Petersburg.

The State Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee has issued this refusal despite calls from Russ­ian and inter­na­tion­al human rights activists and a grow­ing inter­na­tion­al con­sen­sus among both gov­ern­ments and activists that the Mag­nit­sky case must be inves­ti­gat­ed. The State Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee also intends to with­hold from pub­lic inspec­tion the results of the ongo­ing inves­ti­ga­tion into the denial of med­ical care to Mag­nit­sky in the final months of his life.

“Mr Bas­trykin yes­ter­day tried to present the Mag­nit­sky case as a com­plex med­ical mat­ter while in fact this case is sim­ply about the tor­ture and inhu­man treat­ment of a young man in cus­tody which result­ed in his death,” said a Her­mitage Cap­i­tal rep­re­sen­ta­tive. “For months Mag­nit­sky was deprived of sleep, access to clean water and hot food, trans­ferred numer­ous times between cells at night, denied vis­its of his fam­i­ly and young chil­dren, denied pre­scribed surgery, ultra­sound and even sim­ple lab tests and on his last day was left to die on the cell floor for sev­er­al hours with no doc­tor present. These are not mat­ters that are dif­fi­cult to under­stand. In fact, they are mat­ters that have earned the sym­pa­thy of every­one who hears Magnitsky’s trag­ic sto­ry. It appears that Mr Bas­trykin is afraid of pub­lic scruti­ny over this case and the government’s fail­ure to bring any­one to jus­tice 16 months after Sergei died.”

Last March, Lud­mi­la Alex­ee­va, the Head of the Moscow Helsin­ki Group wrote to Mr Bas­trykin request­ing that the State Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee open a crim­i­nal inves­ti­ga­tion into the unlaw­ful arrest and tor­ture of Mag­nit­sky by the very Inte­ri­or Min­istry offi­cers whom Mag­nit­sky impli­cat­ed in his tes­ti­mo­ny describ­ing the theft of $230 mil­lion of pub­lic funds (http://www.rian.ru/tvsociety/20100422/225594848.html).

One year lat­er, the State Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee still refus­es to acknowl­edge that Mag­nit­sky was tor­tured in cus­tody. Instead, the Inte­ri­or Min­istry offi­cers named in Ms Alexeeva’s com­plaint remain in office and have been promoted.

In Decem­ber 2010, REDRESS, an inter­na­tion­al NGO assist­ing vic­tims of tor­ture, applied to the UN Rap­por­teur on Tor­ture and the UN Rap­por­teur on the Inde­pen­dence of Lawyers and Judges request­ing that they inves­ti­gate the tor­ture of Mag­nit­sky. In its request, REDRESS empha­sized that high-lev­el Russ­ian gov­ern­ment offi­cials were respon­si­ble for Magnitsky’s per­se­cu­tion and any inves­ti­ga­tion must be free from their interference.

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