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Investigation Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia on Magnitsky's case - 1
Angela Kastuyeva, head of the press-service of the Investigation Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia:
Specialists who know at least the basics of public relations know
how to pass to the public one or another type of information in a light favorable to their clients.
Everyone realizes that not much is needed to do that: to say nothing about some facts,
not even not to say anything but not to tell everything.
At the same time, one has to rather embellish other facts,
and significantly embellish the most salient facts that we can observe in this case.
I will focus on a couple of examples.
In the report prepared by "Hermitage" there is the following remark
made by the ex-deputy of Bundestag and special reporter at the Council of Europe,
Sabine Leutheusser Schnarrenberger. Here it is.
I would like to say that this phrase has been taken out of context
and presented in a deliberately favourable light to "Hermitage".
In fact, the original of the phrase is slightly different.
This is the original phrase given in the report presented at the Council of Europe.
In fact, no one explained that there were two separate criminal cases at that moment.
One case was initiated by the Investigation Committee at the Internal Affairs Ministry
and another case initiated by the Investigation Committee of the Russian Federation,
the ex-General Prosecutor's Office.
Regarding one of these cases Magnitsky was interviewed as a witness
and regarding the second case he was a defendant arrested and later detained.
Every edition tries to present Magnitsky as a lawyer.
It is no accident that William Browder refers to Magnitsky in all of his interviews as a lawyer,
although he could not know about his profession.
In front of you is the service record of Magnitsky.
The next note is given from the report made by "Hermitage".
It states that three Russian company-foundations have been illegally re-registered
with the help of documents which were found by law-enforcement bodies
during raids at these companies.
This information has been checked, no proof of it has been found and expert reports entirely reject it.
It has been established that documents presented to the 46th Tax Department
on the re-registration of corporate bodies, of these three firms, Makhaon, Parfenion and Rilend,
seal impressions are not the same as the seal impressions confiscated during the raid.
There is also the decision of the Arbitration Court, which confirmed the re-registration as legal,
as well as the decision of the Investigation Committee of the Russian Federation
on non- involvement of the law-enforcement bodies in this re-registration.
The fact that Magnitsky was involved in this operation
is proven by protocols of interviews of convicted persons, including Khlebnikov,
where he talks about his connection with Magnitsky and their relations,
as well as reports of interviews of the already-convicted Markelov
and ex-employee of Firestone Duncan, Konstantin Ponomarev.
Let us look at another inconsistency.
In particular, the statement promulgated by the "Hermitage" fund,
according to which 5.4 billion rubles of taxes paid to the Treasury of the Russian Federation
were paid in the course of one day and were approved by the Tax Inspectorate.
I would like to say that after the companies Makhaon, Parfenion and Rilend
addressed the tax authorities with the request to return the overpaid amount on profit
by aforementioned inspections, there had been a three-month inspection.
However, as was established later, employees of these tax inspections were misled
regarding the authenticity of the documents presented,
based on which the funds had been transferred.
The next statement invoked by the "Hermitage" fund claiming that the authorities
of the Ministry of Internal Affairs involved employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs,
who had allegedly been disclosed by Sergey Magnitsky
as the main figures in this embezzlement in the investigation of the case.
Thus, Sergey Magnitsky was allegedly arrested by the same people
against whom he was bearing testimony.
In fact, Magnitsky never gave any disclosing testimonies against the law-enforcement bodies.
He has not conducted any independent inquiry.
There is no proof of the unfounded claims according to which he conducted an inquiry.
At the interrogation, and you see in front of you an extract from this interrogation,
he only reproduced the sequence of events:
who and when came to whom and what documents they confiscated.
After the first interrogation he refused to give any further testimony,
referring to the 51st article of the Russian Constitution - refusal to give testimony against oneself.
Concerning the members of the investigation group.
The people under investigation have a right to move to accuse members of the investigation group.
However, at the moment of detention and arrest, Magnitsky did not require to disqualify anyone.
Only at the end of the investigation did he recall his right to do so.
At the same time, he never accused the investigators of having personal interests.
In each case the arguments of Magnitsky boiled down to his disagreement
with the output of investigator Silchenko on this case.
Allegedly at the order of the Ministry of Internal Affairs,
the isolation wards of Magnitsky were always changing.
Moreover, the isolation ward where he was transferred had worse conditions and it was done on purpose.
Firstly, there is a letter on the criminal case with a doctor's report stating
that the condition of Magnitsky was satisfactory and that he was allowed
to take part in the actions of the investigation.
Secondly, the transfer of persons under arrest from one penitentiary institution to another
is not a violation of the current law of Russia.
All isolation wards, according to the current law, are de jure equal.
The decision to transfer from one isolation ward to another was adopted
not by the authorities of the Minsitry of Internal Affairs,
by investigators or any other persons who were interested in it,
but based on a letter which was sent from the isolation ward.
The reason given for the transfer was renovation work.
Moreover, this decision did not involve only Magnitsky but also other people in that isolation ward.
There is a statement claiming that defenders repeatedly asked the authorities
to conduct a medical examination of Magnitsky.
Firstly, the participation of investigators is not necessary in decisions regarding any medical examination.
Defenders of the accused, and I am certain that they knew about it,
as well as the defendant himself, had a right to ask for medical help in custody themselves.
On 2 September 2009 the investigation authorities sent a corresponding note
to the defenders of Magnitsky.
Moreover, in the course of investigation, Magnistky and his lawyers sent 183 statements, complaints and requests.
After analyzing them one can say that they pointed out to the illegitimacy of expert reports,
choice of measure of restraint, transfer from one investigation isolation ward to another,
violations of set term periods for request reviews, disclosure of documents confiscated during the raid.
However, there is not a single statement concerning the serious medical disease of the defendant.
The last and most loaded issue concerns causes of death of Magnitsky.
The "Hermitage" fund accuses officials of replacing the cause of death
and proclaiming it as congestive heart failure. In fact, no one has replaced anything.
The cause of death was established in a highly reliable way only on December 29, 2009.
According to results of the medical-legal expert analysis,
and conclusions concerning the cause of death could be made only by medical-legal experts
and only after the necessary analysis, which took place on December 29, 2009.
According to the results of the expert medical analysis,
the cause of death established by experts was congestive heart failure.