Jamison Firestone: “What Future Do They Want for Russia?”

On Friday a popular Russian daily, MK, printed a story that blames Sergei Magnitsky’s lawyers for “letting” him die. For not advising him to just sign anything the investigators wanted so he could get out of detention (see MK article in Russian by Vadim Rechkalov: http://www.mk.ru/social/article/2010/07/15/516832-magnitskoe-pole-chast-2.html).

I am sickened that the author of the MK story is so cynical. He believes it was stupid for Sergei to maintain his dignity when held in pre-trial detention by criminals. MK believes that Sergei was a fool for not degrading himself; for not withdrawing his testimony against corrupt Interior Ministry officers and for not bearing false witness against innocent people to save himself. MK asserts that his lawyers were bad lawyers for not advising him to do this. How low has MK fallen when they condone complicity with evil and corruption and officially brand those who fight corruption to be fools? When did the mark of a bad lawyer become failing to stop a client from fighting evil and corruption? or failing to convince a client to implicate innocents?

The MK article degrades the very qualities that made Sergey a true man and a hero. Its author would have the lawyers of Russia accept corruption and legal nihilism as a fact that must not be challenged and to advise their clients accordingly. To the defense of Sergei’s lawyers – they advised him how he could save himself and end his torture in detention. They did tell him, multiple times, that all he had to do was stop testifying against the police and say whatever they wanted and it would go easier for him. I am not aware of them advising Sergei to lie to save his life but I know his lawyers well and they did tell Sergei how he could save himself.

But Sergei flat out refused to lie and withdraw his testimony against the criminals in uniforms and he refused to accuse others of crimes they did not commit. His lawyer told me that he told Sergei that the more he accused the Interior Ministry officers of corruption the worse it would be for him but “this was Magnitsky!”

That last comment said it all. That was Sergei Magnitsky. He refused to give false testimony against innocent people even though he realized that those people were out of the country and were safe.

He refused to compromise his honesty, decency and morality and he refused to lose faith in the legal system. All of us who sat abroad would have preferred he signed anything rather then die. But Sergei refused to compromise himself. He did not want to become part of the corruption that he despised. He believed that one could fight evil and that one must fight it.

And this is what MK condemns?! Where is their humanity? Where is their decency? What future do the editor and writers of MK want for Russia? A future where the state is run by criminals? A future where people are arrested for nothing and give false confessions and implicate innocents for non existent crimes? A future where lawyers encourage us to do these things to each other? That Russia return to the horrors of its past?!

I have no words. This short commentary cannot properly express my outrage. How did we come to this? When white is painted as black and decency is painted as stupidity.

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