Moscow Prosecutor Office Denies an Independent Medical Examination into the Cause of Death of Sergey Magnitskiy

November 19, 2009

Moscow Pros­e­cu­tor Office Denies an Inde­pen­dent Med­ical Exam­i­na­tion into the Cause of Death of Sergey Magnitskiy

19 Novem­ber 2009  –  The lawyers of Sergey Mag­nit­skiy have been informed that the Moscow Pros­e­cu­tor Office reject­ed a request for an inde­pen­dent med­ical exam­i­na­tion into his death.

Sergey Mag­nit­skiy died on 16 Novem­ber 2009 in a Moscow prison, where he was kept with­out tri­al for 12 months. His moth­er request­ed an inde­pen­dent med­ical exam­i­na­tion into the cause of death of her 37-year old son. The appeal was made by lawyers to the Pre­o­brazhen­sky dis­trict of the Moscow Pros­e­cu­tor Office.

Rel­a­tives have rea­son­able doubts about the par­tial­i­ty of the results of the med­ical exam­i­na­tion over­seen by the inves­ti­ga­tors respon­si­ble for his deten­tion, and prison offi­cials. These offi­cials repeat­ed­ly with­held med­ical care from Sergey Mag­nit­skiy, reject­ing his requests for an ultra­sound med­ical exam­i­na­tion, and for surgery to treat an ill­ness that he had been diag­nosed with while in pre-tri­al deten­tion. In spite of this, the request for an inde­pen­dent exam­i­na­tion was reject­ed by the Moscow Pros­e­cu­tor Office for the Pre­o­brazhen­sky district.

The funer­al of Sergey Mag­nit­skiy will take place tomor­row, Fri­day, 20 Novem­ber 2009, at noon at the Pre­o­brazhen­sky ceme­tery in Moscow.  He leaves behind a wife and two children.

For fur­ther information:

+44 207 440 1777

info@hermitagefund.com

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