US Government Sanctions Russian Officials Who Posthumously Accused Sergei Magnitsky in the US$230 Million Fraud He Had Uncovered

February 2, 2016

US Gov­ern­ment Sanc­tions Russ­ian Offi­cials Who Posthu­mous­ly Accused Sergei Mag­nit­sky in the US$230 Mil­lion Fraud He Had Uncovered

2 Feb­ru­ary 2016 – The Unit­ed States gov­ern­ment has announced visa bans and asset freezes on sev­er­al Russ­ian offi­cials involved in the posthu­mous accu­sa­tion of Sergei Mag­nit­sky in the US$230 Mil­lion fraud that he had in fact uncovered.

“This is an impor­tant devel­op­ment in the con­tin­ued fight for jus­tice in the Sergei Mag­nit­sky case. In spite of inter­na­tion­al con­dem­na­tion, Russ­ian author­i­ties con­tin­ue to false­ly accuse Sergei Mag­nit­sky in the $230 mil­lion theft from the Russ­ian gov­ern­ment that he uncov­ered and exposed. These sanc­tions show that it is not accept­able for the peo­ple involved in the crime to hide behind a man they killed,” said Bill Brow­der, leader of the Mag­nit­sky Jus­tice campaign.

The new Mag­nit­sky-relat­ed sanc­tions list announced by the US Trea­sury includes four Russ­ian Inte­ri­or Min­istry offi­cials involved in posthu­mous pro­ceed­ings against Sergei Magnitsky:

1) Alex­ei Anichin, most senior Russ­ian offi­cial on the list, was (until June 2011) Deputy Inte­ri­or Min­is­ter and Head of the Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee of the Inte­ri­or Min­istry of Rus­sia, which orga­nized the arrest and deten­tion of Sergei Mag­nit­sky, and pres­sured him to with­draw tes­ti­mo­ny impli­cat­ing Russ­ian Inte­ri­or Min­istry offi­cials in the US$230 mil­lion fraud, with Alex­ei Anichin per­son­al­ly sign­ing a decree in those pro­ceed­ings in July 2008. After Sergei Mag­nit­sky died, the Anichin-led Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee advanced false accu­sa­tions against Sergei Mag­nit­sky posthumously.

2) Pavel Lap­shov, Colonel of the Russ­ian Inte­ri­or Min­istry, served (until Octo­ber 2012) as Head of the Orga­nized Crime and Cor­rup­tion Direc­torate of the Inte­ri­or Ministry’s Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee. He appeared at a press con­fer­ence in Decem­ber 2011 to advance false posthu­mous accu­sa­tions against Mag­nit­sky and exon­er­ate com­plic­it offi­cials (http://www.novayagazeta.ru/news/52474.html).

3) Boris Kibis, inves­ti­ga­tor of the Russ­ian Inte­ri­or Min­istry, who dur­ing 2011 – 2012 was in charge of the posthu­mous pro­ceed­ing opened against Sergei Mag­nit­sky after his death. Kibis also issued mul­ti­ple sum­mons­es to Sergei Magnitsky’s moth­er and tried to remove her lawyer who chal­lenged the posthu­mous proceedings.

4) Oleg Urzhumt­sev, is a close asso­ciate of the crim­i­nal orga­ni­za­tion exposed by Sergei Mag­nit­sky. He was an inves­ti­ga­tor from the Russ­ian Inte­ri­or Min­istry put in charge of inves­ti­gat­ing the crim­i­nal con­spir­a­cy. In that role he exon­er­at­ed its key mem­bers, and posthu­mous­ly accused Sergei Mag­nit­sky of the $230 mil­lion fraud that Mag­nit­sky had uncov­ered. While in charge of “inves­ti­gat­ing” the Mag­nit­sky-uncov­ered crim­i­nal con­spir­a­cy, inves­ti­ga­tor Oleg Urzhumt­sev trav­eled with Andrei Pavlov and Yulia May­oro­va, the two key per­sons whose role in the crim­i­nal con­spir­a­cy he was sup­posed to inves­ti­gate, to Ukraine and back to Rus­sia dur­ing 8 – 10 July 2008 http://russian-untouchables.com/rus/docs/F13.pdf. He then ques­tioned them in the two fol­low­ing months, on 21 August and 21 Sep­tem­ber 2008, about the cir­cum­stances of the crim­i­nal con­spir­a­cy and found on wrong­do­ing in their actions. The con­nec­tion of Oleg Urzhumt­sev to Andrei Pavlov, a close asso­ciate of the leader of the crim­i­nal con­spir­a­cy, Dmit­ry Klyuev, who him­self had been pre­vi­ous­ly sanc­tioned under the Mag­nit­sky Act, goes back as far back as 2005 based on the joint trav­el pat­tern http://russian-untouchables.com/rus/docs/F14.pdf.

“The Mag­nit­sky Act was intend­ed to be an open-end­ed process, and we are reg­u­lar­ly review­ing the sit­u­a­tion to see whether there are addi­tion­al des­ig­na­tions pos­si­ble,” said the US State Depart­ment official.

Explain­ing the new Mag­nit­sky-relat­ed des­ig­na­tion, the US State Depart­ment offi­cial said:

“Alek­sey Anichin was the for­mer head of the Russ­ian inte­ri­or ministry’s inves­tiga­tive depart­ment. He was – he had autho­rized the crim­i­nal case under which Sergei Mag­nit­sky was orig­i­nal­ly arrest­ed. Pavel Lap­shov was the head of the inte­ri­or ministry’s inves­tiga­tive depart­ment of orga­nized crim­i­nal activ­i­ty. He was – his inves­tiga­tive unit con­clud­ed that Mag­nit­sky him­self was respon­si­ble for the con­spir­a­cy which Mag­nit­sky uncov­ered. Two of the oth­ers – that is, Urzhumt­sev and Kibis – were involved in the posthu­mous pros­e­cu­tion of Magnitsky.”

The new Mag­nit­sky-relat­ed des­ig­na­tion offi­cial­ly pub­lished on 1 Feb­ru­ary 2016, con­tains five indi­vid­u­als, bring­ing the total num­ber of per­sons sanc­tioned since the enact­ment of the “Sergei Mag­nit­sky Rule of Law Account­abil­i­ty Act,” to 39.

For more infor­ma­tion, please contact:​

Jus­tice for Sergei Mag­nit­sky Campaign

+44 207 440 1777

e‑mail: info@lawandorderinrussia.org

www.lawandorderinrussia.org

Twit­ter: @KatieFisher__

www.facebook.com/russianuntouchables

billbrowder.com

List of New Mag­nit­sky-relat­ed Designations:

https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/OFAC-Enforcement/Pages/20160201.aspx

Annu­al Report on the Imple­men­ta­tion of the Sergei Mag­nit­skyRule of Law Account­abil­i­ty Act:

http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2016/02/251969.htm?goMobile=0

Brief­ing by Senior State Depart­ment Offi­cial ViaT­ele­con­fer­ence, Feb­ru­ary 1, 2016:

http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2016/02/251989.htm

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