Russian Investigator Cleared in Prison Death
Russian prosecutors exonerated the lead investigator in the case of Sergei Magnitsky, a hedge-fund attorney who died in jail after what colleagues said was an attempt to expose a massive theft of government funds in 2009.
Acitivists conducting an independent probe of the case called the ruling a whitewash of the case, despite President Dmitry Medvedev’s repeated promises of a full investigation. The handling of Mr. Magnitsky’s death has emerged as a litmus test of Mr. Medvedev’s willingness to investigate corruption in the security services, whose strength and clout have crept throughout the Russian economy.
Russia’s powerful Investigative Committee issued a three-paragraph statement Monday absolving the investigator in the case, Oleg Silchenko, of any blame, saying he had “not allowed” any legal violations in the case.
Read More →
After Swiss Freeze Millions, Stepanov Swings Back
An abbreviated version of this story ran in May 28 edition of Barron’s Magazine.
Swiss prosecutors have frozen Eur. 8 million in Credit Suisse bank accounts of Vladlen Stepanov, a subject of our story about a $230 million tax scam in Russia that victimized the hedge fund firm Hermitage Capital and led to the death in police custody of Hermitage’s whistle blowing lawyer Sergei Magnitsky (“Crime and Punishment in Putin’s Russia,” April 16).
Stepanov isn’t taking the Swiss action lying down. Last week he placed a self-justifying advertisement in a Russian newspaper, and this week he appeared for a video-taped interview at the Russian financial daily Vedomosti. In both forums, Stepanov denies that the Swiss bank money, and other riches detailed in our article, were illicitly obtained or derived from the hundreds of millions in dubious Russian tax refunds doled out by Olga Stepanova, a former tax official from whom Stepanov says he’s been divorced since 1992.
The evidence of corruption amongst police and other officials involved in the Magnitsky case has created enough of a stink that President Dmitry Medvedev called a press conference last week to discuss an independent inquiry into the scandal.
“I do not want to be a wood chip,” is the headline of Stepanov’s May 17th ad in the RBK Daily newspaper – an allusion to a Russian proverb suggesting that he sees himself as an innocent victim who’s been ground up in the chainsawing of a forest. He dismisses as “recreational arithmetic,” the estimates of his wealth presented in “horror videos” about the Magnitsky case produced by Hermitage Capital’s founder William F. Browder (see www.russian-untouchables.com).
Read More →
Investigation into Magnitsky’s case continues
Russia’s Prosecutor General has found no violations on the part of the investigator, who handled the case of Sergei Magnitsky, a spokesman for Russia’s Investigative Committee, Vladimir Markin, said on Monday. At the request of Russia’s Investigative Committee, the Office of the Prosecutor General checked the legality of actions, taken by the investigators regarding the Hermitage Capital Investment Fund worker Sergei Magnitsky.
Lawyer Sergei Magnitsky was accused of tax evasion regarding his revenues from the work of the companies belonging to the investment fund. According to the investigators, the Hermitage Capital Investment Fund and the Firestone Duncan Consulting Firm, where Magnitsky headed the Tax and Audit Department, created a scheme of tax evasion with the use of a ramified network of branch companies. As a result, more than 5 billion roubles were stolen.
Read More →
Kremlin Ombudsman Urges Prosecution Over Hermitage Death
A senior Russian investigator should be prosecuted for his role in the death of Sergei Magnitsky, the Hermitage Capital Management Ltd. lawyer who died in November 2009 after almost a year in pre-trial detention, a presidential human rights ombudsman said.
The comments from Valery Borshchev, a member of the human rights council set up by President Dmitry Medvedev, came a day after the Investigative Committee said Oleg Silchenko hadn’t committed any legal violations in prosecuting Magnitsky, who was 37 when he died of heart failure. Borshchev’s committee is conducting its own probe.
Silchenko refused Magnitsky’s request for an ultra-sound scan and operation, Borshchev said today by telephone. “This refusal played a central role in Magnitsky’s death, so this is enough to bring charges against Silchenko,” he said.
Read More →
Murder case puts pressure on EU-Russia diplomacy
EU diplomacy should be guided by basic moral imperatives and open parliamentary politics, not behind-closed-doors strategising, a prominent campaigner has said.
Bill Browder, a US-born British venture capitalist who a few years ago was the biggest foreign investor on the Russian stock market, is targeting the European Parliament and national EU assemblies to make the European Council impose sanctions on Russian officials.
Browder has put together a list of 60 people in the Russian interior ministry, justice system and the secret police, the FSB, who he says tortured and murdered his lawyer, Sergei Magnitsky, after he exposed their multi-million-euro tax scam.
On Monday (30 May), the Russian general prosecutor in a statement said one of the top men on the list, Oleg Silchenko, committed “no violations of federal law”, in what Browder’s side called an ongoing “whitewash” that “damages the credibility” of the Russian government.
Browder, who has published hard evidence of how the Russian officials scammed the Russian taxpayer, wants the EU to impose an asset freeze and travel ban on the men and women involved.
Read More →
Police Investigator Is Cleared in Death of Russian Awaiting Trial
Russia’s Investigative Committee said Monday that prosecutors had cleared a police investigator of any wrongdoing in the case of Sergei L. Magnitsky, whose death in pre-trial detention is viewed as a test of country’s law enforcement and judicial systems.
Mr. Magnitsky, 37, who had been arrested after accusing police investigators of a huge tax fraud, died in a prison clinic after complaining for days about acute abdominal pain and untreated pancreatitis.
Central decisions about Mr. Magnitsky’s medical treatment were made by Oleg F. Silchenko, the lead investigator in the case against him, who transferred him to a prison with minimal medical facilities despite a serious diagnosis. He also authorized Mr. Magnitsky’s arrest on tax evasion charges, detained him for 11 months as a flight risk and refused repeated requests for a follow-up ultrasound that had been prescribed by a doctor.
Read More →
Magnitsky charges were fabricated, inquiry says; Justice Leaked document shows commission will blame Interior Ministry officials and FSB for lawyer’s cell death
Daily Telegraph
In a landmark investigation Into the cell death of Moscow lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, a special Kremlin commission Is likely to publicly Implicate iriGmDors of the Interior Ministry and FSB.
The metal cage used for prisoners in courtroom No 14 at the Tverskoi regional court was empty during a recent hearing, its door wide open, when the court considered the arrest of Ivan Cherkasov, a senior executive at British investment fund Hermitage Capital.
Mr Cherkasov, who lives in London, said he has no intention of returning to face charges of tax evasion he says are false. He said his arrest was an act of revenge by members of the Russian security services.
Read More →
Investigator Silchenko was absolved of all Guilt in Connection with Sergei Magnitsky’s death in detention cell
It was the Russian Investigative Committee that demanded from the Prosecutor General’s Office to run a check of Silchenko’s actions and performance in the course of the investigation that ended in the suspect’s demise. The demand for the investigation was made on May 11 within the framework of the broader investigation of the circumstances of the auditor’s death. It took the Prosecutor General’s Office just over a week to make a formal answer.
According to the Prosecutor General’s Office, a thorough investigation of Silchenko’s actions failed to uncover any violations of the federal legislation that might be qualified as encroachment on the constitutional rights of the involved persons.
Russian Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin pointed out that the demand to the Prosecutor General’s Office concerned a check of all circumstances of the investigation involving Magnitsky (including the grounds on which criminal charges had been pressed against him and whether or not all procedures had been observed properly, choice of the measure of restraint, extension of preliminary detention, and consideration of the suspects’ complaints and requests).
Read More →
Dead lawyer’s supporters fume after Silchenko is exonerated by prosecutors
Oleg Silchenko, the man who activists and western politicians accuse of bringing about Sergei Magnitsky’s death, has been cleared by the Prosecutor General’s office.
Vladimir Markin, Investigative Committee spokesman, said Lt.Col. Silchenko had not violated any federal laws in “pressing criminal charges and arresting” Magtnitsky, or in extending his custody as trial approached, RIA Novosti reported.
Magnistky died in detention awaiting trial for the same embezzlement charges he was accusing government officials of. He died aged 37 after being denied medical treatment for pancreatitis.
Read More →
-
To learn more about what happened to Sergei Magnitsky please read below
- Sergei Magnitsky
- Why was Sergei Magnitsky arrested?
- Sergei Magnitsky’s torture and death in prison
- President’s investigation sabotaged and going nowhere
- The corrupt officers attempt to arrest 8 lawyers
- Past crimes committed by the same corrupt officers
- Petitions requesting a real investigation into Magnitsky's death
- Worldwide reaction, calls to punish those responsible for corruption and murder
- Complaints against Lt.Col. Kuznetsov
- Complaints against Major Karpov
- Cover up
- Press about Magnitsky
- Bloggers about Magnitsky
- Corrupt officers:
- Sign petition
- Citizen investigator
- Join Justice for Magnitsky group on Facebook
- Contact us
- Sergei Magnitsky
