Posts Tagged ‘posthumous’
Russia set for posthumous Magnitsky trial
Russia will press ahead tomorrow with its highly unusual posthumous prosecution of a whistleblowing lawyer who revealed how members of the government’s powerful Interior Ministry were part of a gang that stole £230m from Russian taxpayers.
The trial of Sergei Magnitsky, who died in November 2009 after months of neglect and torture in a Russian jail cell, will begin behind closed doors with the chairs of the two defendants left empty. His co-accused – the British hedge-fund manage William Browder – is banned from entering Russia and has refused to take part in what he has described as a “Stalin show trial”.
The case has become a source of international embarrassment for Moscow with America recently banning any officials involved in the arrest and death of Mr Magnitsky from holding assets in the US or travelling there. Moscow responded with a ban on Americans adopting Russian orphans.
Supporters of Mr Magnitsky say he was jailed and killed for daring to expose how a network of Russian officials and criminal underworld figures used complex tax frauds to steal money from the Russian people. Russian prosecutors admit the frauds occurred but after initially blaming a number of low- level crime figures (some of whom were dead before the scams took place) they have since switched to accusing Mr Magnitsky and Mr Browder of carrying out the crimes they say they uncovered.
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Dead lawyer to go on trial in Russia
The posthumous trial of Sergei Magnitsky, a crusading lawyer who died in prison in 2009, is set to begin in Moscow on Monday. The trial is part of an effort by Russia’s government to push back against countries adopting blacklists similar to the Magnitsky law passed last December by the US.
As far as anyone can remember, it will be the first trial of a dead defendant in Russian, or Soviet, history and most expect a speedy conviction.
Bill Browder, the head of investment fund Hermitage Capital, and Mr Magnitsky’s former chief, says he believes the trial is connected to the passage last December of the Magnitsky law in the US, which imposes a visa blacklist and asset freezes on certain Russian officials accused of human rights violations.
Mr Browder recently began a campaign to promote similar laws in Europe, starting with a trip to Paris last week.
“This is just pure vindictive nastiness because they are trying to get some sort of conviction right away,” said Mr Browder. “They can then go around the world and say: ‘Look, you’re naming a law after a convicted criminal.’”
A representative of the prosecutor’s office said it had no additional comment. “The case materials explain everything. We have nothing additional to say.”
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Russia opens trial of dead lawyer Magnitsky
A Russian court has opened the fraud trial against Sergei Magnitsky, a lawyer who died in prison in 2009 after accusing state officials of a multimillion-dollar tax scam.
The posthumous trial on Monday was initially scheduled for last December, but the judge adjourned the hearing after his family’s defence lawyers refused to participate, saying trying a dead man was illegal.
Because no lawyer for the Magnitsky family showed up, the judge ordered the lawyers association to appoint a defense attorney for the next preliminary hearing on February 18.
“Participation in this process is illegal and immoral,” Nikolay Gorokhov said in an interview with Al Jazeera’s Emma Hayward.
“Sergei Magnitsky’s mother and I characterise it as dancing on the bones of a dead man because you can not prosecute someone who is dead.”
The whistleblowing lawyer’s family has also refused to participate saying it is politically motivated.
“I think it is inhuman to try a dead man,” Magnitsky’s mother Natalya told Reuters news agency by telephone. “This is not a court case but some kind of farce, and I will not take part in it.”
Magnitsky was 37 when he died after 358 days in jail, during which he said he was denied treatment as his health declined. The Kremlin’s own human rights council aired suspicions he was beaten to death.
Russian authorities said he died of a heart attack, but his former employer, investment fund Hermitage Capital, says he was killed because he was investigating a $230m theft by law enforcement and tax officials through fraudulent tax refunds.
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Russia presses on with plans to try dead whistleblower
Russia pushed forward with plans for the posthumous trial of a lawyer on tax evasion charges on Monday, despite a boycott by relatives and lawyers who said President Vladimir Putin’s government was “dancing on the grave of a dead man”.
Sergei Magnitsky died in 2009 after complaining repeatedly he was denied treatment as his health declined in jail, prompting the United States last month to bar entry to Russians accused of involvement in his death or serious rights abuses.
Putin, restored to the presidency in May, has dismissed the international furor over the case, saying last month the lawyer had died of a heart attack.
Although Putin has rejected suggestions Magnitsky was tortured in prison, the Kremlin’s own human rights council has voiced suspicions he was beaten to death.
Magnitsky’s former employer, investment fund Hermitage Capital, says the lawyer was killed because he had accused law enforcement and tax officers of stealing $230 million from the state by setting up bogus tax refunds.
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Magnitsky hearing postponed as mother urges Russian lawyers to boycott trial
The preliminary hearing of the posthumous trial of Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky has been postponed after his family and their lawyers refused to take part in the trial.
Russian authorities had required Magnitsky’s mother and widow to be present at the trial to speak on his behalf, but after both they and their lawyers refused to participate, only the judge and the prosecution appeared in court yesterday.
Hermitage Capital Founder Bill Browder, for whom Magnitsky was working when he was detained in 2009, is also due to be examined in the hearing, albeit in absentia. It is understood that he is one of few foreigners ever to be tried in absentia in Russia.
The hearing is now due to take place on 18 February and Judge Igor Alisov and the Russian authorities are planning to appoint lawyers to defend both Magnitksy and Browder.
Earlier this month, Natalya Magnitskaya, Magnitsky’s mother, appealed via a formal application to Moscow Bar Association chairman Henri Reznik to urge all of its members to not participate as ‘state-appointed counsel’ in the trial.
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Posthumous trial of Russian lawyer delayed
The trial of Russian lawyer and whistleblower Sergei Magnitsky officially began yesterday, but has been postponed for several weeks. This was not, as one might expect, because Magnitsky died in prison more than three years ago, but because his defense team has chosen not to participate in the bizarre proceeding:
In Monday’s hearing, it was unclear who or what, exactly, went on trial. Mr. Magnitsky’s co-defendant, William F. Browder, the manager of the Hermitage Capital hedge fund, has been barred from entering Russia since 2005, so he did not appear in court.
The hearing was of a type in Russian practice that indicates that the police consider their work complete, and that the case can go to trial, Aleksandra V. Bereznina, a spokeswoman for Tverskoi Regional Court, said in an interview.
Judge Igor B. Alisov promptly postponed the trial because the defendants did not appear in the courtroom — as expected — but neither did lawyers representing their interests.[…]
The hearing took place in a closed courtroom. The defendants’ chairs were unoccupied, Ms. Bereznina said. Mr. Browder and relatives of Mr. Magnitsky have said they will boycott the proceedings.
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Attorneys assigned for Magnitsky’s tax evasion case
Moscow’s Tverskoy District Court on Monday ruled to appoint an attorney for the tax evasion case against deceased Hermitage Capital auditor Sergei Magnitsky, who died while in a pretrial detention facility in 2009.
Under Russian criminal law, a dead person can be prosecuted. According to Article 24 of the Russian Code of Criminal Procedure, proceedings can be closed against a deceased person who stood accused of some crime pending the consent of his relatives. The case would then be closed on so-called non-rehabilitative grounds meaning that relatives of the person do not demand the deceased person to be recognized as innocent.
Preliminary hearings in the case had previously been postponed because the attorneys defending Magnitsky and Hermitage Capital Management Bill Browder, who has also been accused of tax evasion, did not appear in court.
Thus the court has appointed attorneys for both Magnitsky and Browder.
“The preliminary hearing which was to be held today has been postponed until 11:00 a.m. on February 18 because Magnitsky and Browder’s attorneys have not appeared in court. The court has decided to appoint attorneys for them. The next court session will also be preliminary and will be held behind closed doors,” the court’s press secretary, Alexandra Berezina, told journalists.
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Hearing Postponed In Posthumous Trial Of Magnitsky
A preliminary hearing has been postponed in the posthumous trial of Sergei Magnitsky, the Russian lawyer who died in prison in 2009 after accusing government officials in a massive fraud scheme.
A Magnitsky family lawyer told the Interfax news agency that the family would not cooperate in the trial, which has now been set for February 18. The court announced it will appoint lawyers to defend Magnitsky.
Prosecutors filed new charges of tax evasion against Magnitsky last year. Charges have also been filed against William Browder, the owner of the Hermitage Capital investment fund where Magnitsky worked. Browder, who is outside Russia, is to be tried in absentia.
Supporters, NGOs, and the Kremlin’s own human rights commission say the 37-year-old Magnitsky was denied proper medical care and abused during nearly a year in pre-trial detention. He was arrested after implicating mid-ranking Interior Ministry and tax officials in a $230 million scheme to defraud the government. His case has become an international symbol of Russia’s human rights and rule-of-law failings.
According to Professor David M. Crane, who specializes in international criminal and humanitarian law at Syracuse University College of Law in the United States, the proceedings against Magnitsky are highly unusual.
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Russia presses on with plans to try dead whistleblower
Russia pushed forward with plans for the posthumous trial of a lawyer on tax evasion charges on Monday, despite a boycott by relatives and lawyers who said President Vladimir Putin’s government was “dancing on the grave of a dead man”.
Sergei Magnitsky died in 2009 after complaining repeatedly he was denied treatment as his health declined in jail, prompting the United States last month to bar entry to Russians accused of involvement in his death or serious rights abuses.
Putin, restored to the presidency in May, has dismissed the international furor over the case, saying last month the lawyer had died of a heart attack.
Although Putin has rejected suggestions Magnitsky was tortured in prison, the Kremlin’s own human rights council has voiced suspicions he was beaten to death.
Magnitsky’s former employer, investment fund Hermitage Capital, says the lawyer was killed because he had accused law enforcement and tax officers of stealing $230 million from the state by setting up bogus tax refunds.
Magnitsky’s mother and her attorney refused to show up for a preliminary hearing for a trial they denounced as a politically motivated attack on a dead man, forcing the Moscow court hearing the case to appoint defense lawyers.
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