Magnitsky’s Mother Slams the Government’s Cover-Up in Prosecution of Prison Doctor Kratov

October 2, 2012

Natalia Mag­nit­skaya, the moth­er of the late Russ­ian lawyer Sergei Mag­nit­sky, today called on the Russ­ian court to accept new evi­dence show­ing the com­plic­i­ty of a large group of Russ­ian law enforce­ment offi­cials in the tor­ture and killing of her son, and to send the case back to prosecutors. 

In her tes­ti­mo­ny at the Tver­skoi Dis­trict Court in Moscow this morn­ing, Mrs. Mag­nit­skaya gave evi­dence that the indict­ment issued by Russ­ian inves­ti­ga­tors against Dmit­ry Kra­tov, a for­mer deputy head of Butyr­ka prison, does not con­tain cer­tain crit­i­cal fac­tu­al and doc­u­men­tary evi­dence link­ing oth­er offi­cials to the crime against her son. Under the Russ­ian crim­i­nal pro­ce­dur­al code, the court is bound by the scope of the indict­ment in issu­ing its sen­tence and this ommi­sion by the pros­e­cu­tors would lead to a dras­ti­cal­ly more lenient sen­tence. Read more

Magnitsky’s Mother is Expected to Testify Tomorrow in the Trial of the Prison Doctor Charged With Her Son’s Death

October 1, 2012

Natalia Mag­nit­skaya, the moth­er of Sergei Mag­nit­sky, is expect­ed to tes­ti­fy against Dmit­ry Kra­tov, the doc­tor at Burtry­ka Prison who denied her son med­ical atten­tion at his tri­al in Moscow tomorrow.

The court hear­ing will take place at Tver­skoi Dis­trict Court (25а Tsvet­noi Boule­vard, Moscow) at 10:30 am, Tues­day Octo­ber 2^nd. Read more

$135 Million of Russian Government Money Stolen by the Criminal Group Exposed by Sergei Magnitsky Has Been Found in Eight Different Countries

September 24, 2012

After two years of a foren­sic inves­ti­ga­tion involv­ing the author­i­ties and courts in four dif­fer­ent coun­tries, jour­nal­ists from Novaya Gaze­ta and the Orga­nized Crime and Cor­rup­tion Report­ing Project have iden­ti­fied where $135 mil­lion of the mon­ey stolen from the Russ­ian trea­sury by a crim­i­nal group exposed by the mur­dered lawyer, Sergei Mag­nit­sky, end­ed up. The mon­ey was traced through U.S., Swiss, Moldovan and Russ­ian bank records to accounts in 8 dif­fer­ent juris­dic­tions, 62 off­shore accounts and 20 dif­fer­ent banks. The mon­ey was found in Aus­tria, Switzer­land, Fin­land, Cyprus, Hong Kong and three Baltic republics. Read more

Russian Court to Hear Negligence Indictment in Magnitsky Case

September 13, 2012

Today at 11 am, the Tver­skoi Dis­trict Court in Moscow will begin hear­ings on the indict­ment of Dmit­ry Kra­tov, for­mer deputy chief of Butyr­ka deten­tion cen­ter for med­ical negligence. 

Kratov’s indict­ment absolves him from any respon­si­bil­i­ty for the com­plic­i­ty in Magnitsky’s tor­ture and mur­der. It is signed by Deputy Gen­er­al Pros­e­cu­tor, Vic­tor Grin, the same pros­e­cu­tor who launched the unprece­dent­ed posthu­mous pros­e­cu­tion against Sergei Mag­nit­sky last year. This is the first pros­e­cu­tion of a dead man in Russ­ian history.
The neg­li­gence case will be heard by Judge Tatiana Nevero­va, the same judge who refused Sergei Mag­nit­sky’s peti­tion about the vio­la­tion of his rights when he was still alive.
“Under this case, the inves­ti­ga­tors and pros­e­cu­tors have legalised the know­ing­ly false ver­sion of Magnitsky’s death in deten­tion alleged­ly on med­ical grounds, due to heart fail­ure and made-up diag­noses of sug­ar dia­betes and hepati­tis. This med­ical ver­sion masks the cru­el ret­ri­bu­tion Mag­nit­sky fell vic­tim of for his role in defend­ing his client, the Her­mitage Fund, and in expos­ing the crim­i­nal scheme secret­ly func­tion­ing over sev­er­al years through which bil­lions of rou­bles had been siphoned from the bud­get,” said lawyer Niko­lai Gorokhov, coun­sel to Magnitsky’s mother.
At the pre­lim­i­nary hear­ing that took place on 27 July 2012, the Mag­nit­sky fam­i­ly lawyer request­ed the crim­i­nal case in rela­tion to Kra­tov be returned to pros­e­cu­tors for a full inves­ti­ga­tion of his role in the con­spir­a­cy to false­ly imprison, tor­ture and mur­der Sergei Mag­nit­sky. The judge refused his peti­tion on the grounds that no oth­er co-con­spir­a­tors have been iden­ti­fied in the inves­ti­ga­tion into Magnitsky’s death. 

Judge Nevero­va also refused all oth­er appli­ca­tions from the fam­i­ly’s lawyer.

A year ago, Mrs Mag­nit­skaya wrote to the Russ­ian Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee nam­ing a num­ber of Russ­ian offi­cials for their com­plic­i­ty in the false arrest, tor­ture and mur­der of her son (http://russian-untouchables.com/rus/docs/D275.pdf). The inves­ti­ga­tors have refused to open a probe into those offi­cials named by Magnitsky’s moth­er and have ful­ly exon­er­at­ed them.
In Novem­ber 2010, Sergei Magnitsky’s moth­er received the Glob­al Integri­ty Award from Tans­paren­cy Inter­na­tion­al on behalf of her late son hon­or­ing his fight against Russ­ian gov­ern­ment corruption. 

See a report on the Cov­er up of Magnitsky’s murder:
http://www.russian-untouchables.com/rus/docs/P01RUS.pdf

Russian Government Makes Secret the Names of the 12 Prosecutors Involved in the Posthumous Case Against Sergei Magnitsky to Protect them From US Sanctions

July 24, 2012

Fol­low­ing the progress of the Mag­nit­sky sanc­tions leg­is­la­tion in the US and oth­er coun­tries, the Russ­ian gov­ern­ment has tak­en the unprece­dent­ed step of mak­ing secret the names of all 12 offi­cials from the Russ­ian Gen­er­al Pros­e­cu­tor’s Office involved in pros­e­cut­ing Sergei Mag­nit­sky posthumously.
The group of 12 pros­e­cu­tors was cre­at­ed on 1 June 2011 by deci­sion of Rus­si­a’s Gen­er­al Pros­e­cu­tor Yury Chai­ka, fol­low­ing his meet­ing with then Pres­i­dent Dmit­ry Medvedev, to “strength­en over­sight” over inves­ti­ga­tions in the Mag­nit­sky case. Yuri Chai­ka announced that the group com­prised “creme de la creme” of the Pros­e­cu­tor’s Office. How­ev­er, when the lawyer for Ms Mag­nit­skaya request­ed access to infor­ma­tion about the group and its actions, he was stonewalled. All his peti­tions were reject­ed on unrea­soned ground. Read more

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