Ingushetia: jury acquits Muslim Gutseriev

On February 27, 2006, the Supreme Court of the Republic of Ingushetia held the last sitting of the jury on the case of Muslim Lechievich Gutseriev, born in 1982, a resident of the Chechen Republic, who was accused under Article 209 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation ("Banditism"). Having heard the defendant's last plea, the jurymen retired for consultation and then passed their verdict: Muslim Gutseriev should be acquitted for absence of proofs of his guilt. Gutseriev was set free right in the courtroom.

The Gutseriev's case is notable not only for its unusual finish - complete acquittal and release in the courtroom, but also for preceding events. We narrate them below, based among other things on the statement of Muslim Gutseriev himself handed over to employees of the HRC "Memorial" in Nazran on February 21, 2006.

Muslim Gutseriev was kidnapped on June 28, 2004, from the house of his grandmother (his mother's mother) from the village of Galashki (Sunzha District of Ingushetia). Armed people in camouflage and masks rushed into the house; presumably, they were employees of some unidentified power agency. At that moment Muslim had no passport with him, as mother had brought it for exchange to Grozny. The kidnappers put a bag over Gutseriev's head, put him into one of the cars and took away under the pretext of establishing his personality. The bag was taken off his head only when they arrived to the destination, placed him into some cellar without windows and handcuffed to a heating radiator. Then and there, he was severely beaten. After a while, they put a bag again over his head, took him out, put into a helicopter and transported to some other place, where he was placed into a pit about three meters deep. Periodically, Gutseriev was lifted to the surface and severely beaten, tortured with electricity until loss of consciousness. He was accused of complicity to militants (allegedly, he supplied food to them). Once, when they wanted to lift Gutseriev out of the pit for another interrogation, he refused to go up. The kidnappers started throwing stones on him until he fainted. Then, they pulled him out and tortured again. On that day, a woman was among "power agents". Torture and interrogations continued for half a year. On December 22, 2004, Gutseriev was taken, without outer clothes and in slippers, to the forest and released there with a strict warning not to tell anybody about where he was and what was done with him.

Muslim wandered for a long time in the forest, and then he reached some village. He learnt from a local resident that it was Komgaron village of the Prigorodny District of the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania (RNO-A). The local resident took Muslim to a house of his relatives, where they gave him clothes and food, and reported to the militia in the morning.

Gutseriev told militiamen about what had happened to him. They did not believe him and handed him over to the RUBOP (Department for Fighting Organized Crime) of the RNO-A. There, Gutseriev was again interrogated and beaten, forced to sign confessing evidences under accusations of participating in capturing hostages in Beslan. Then, inspectors began to force him to confess of an attack on power agencies of Ingushetia in June 2004. Despite severe torture and beatings, Gutseriev refused to sign confessional evidences. But when two FSB agents arrived to interrogation and threatened to execute his relatives - to kill his parents and rape his sister of 10, Muslim agreed to sign the papers.

During all this period, Gutseriev's relatives thought that he was dead and had no information about his fate.

In December 2005, Muslim Gutseriev's case was sent to the court. He was charged under Article 209 ("Banditism") of the Russian Criminal Code. According to the indictment, Gutseriev was detained on January 6, 2005, in Grozny in his house, which is not true. However, despite the presented proofs and evidences of the defence witnesses, the court preferred to ignore them.

In his application of February 21, Muslim Gutseriev asked the employees of the "Memorial" to take part in the remaining sessions of the jury and to help him to control over the fair trial and defend his rights. Observers from the HRC "Memorial" were present at the subsequent sessions of the court. As noted above, on February 27, 2006, the jurymen acquitted Muslim Gutseriev for absence of any proofs of his guilt, and he was released in the courtroom. This is the topic of the message that arrived to the editorial office of the "Caucasian Knot".