Boliev's lawyers convinced in framing of the case by power authorities of Dagestan

Today, the court hearing in the Khasavyurt town court of Dagestan has been resumed on the case of the human rights activist Osman Boliev accused of storage, acquisition and wearing of arms. Salimat Kadyrova, Sergey Brovchenko and Ahmed Umaev, the defendant's defence lawyers, report this to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent. As lawyer Umaev has just related from the court room by telephone, the judge has declined the defence application to exclude from the case the evidence obtained with violations of the law. At the moment, arrival to court of witnesses for the prosecution is expected. Their interrogation will start the consideration of the case on its merits.

Osman Boliev, head of the "Romashka" human rights organization, is now undergoing treatment at the neurological department of the Khasavyurt town hospital with the diagnosis of "after-effects of concussion of the brain," reported the department manager, doctor in charge of the patient, to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent by telephone today. According to him, the patient's state of health is improving and approximately in four days the treatment course may be completed.

Boliev is defended by four lawyers: Salimat Kadyrova from Kizilyurt (Dagestan) and Sergey Brovchenko from Moscow, Ahmed Umaev from Khasavyurt and Makhmut Magomadov from Grozny (Chechnya). During the telephone conversation with the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent in the morning Magomadov stated that he had had no idea that the court session on Boliev's case was scheduled for today because he had not received any summons from the court and was not able to attend the hearing. Sergey Brovchenko, Moscow lawyer, who defends Boliev with the assistance of the "Public Verdict" foundation also stated to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that he could not fly to Dagestan for attending the court session.

Salimat Kadyrova, Boliev's Dagestan lawyer, related to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent details of this scandalous case.

According to her, on November 15 of the last year, Osman Boliev was visited at his home in Khasavyurt by two officers of the state traffic safety inspectorate (GIBDD) and claimed that his car looked like the one registered as stolen and Boliev must come with them to the town internal affairs department for checking. Osman followed their instruction. The GIBDD officers drove ahead and Boliev followed them in his car. In the area of the bus station his car was stopped by other militiamen who asked the human rights activist to get into their UAZ for driving to the militia unit.

"As soon as Boliev got into the militia UAZ they put handcuffs on him and a black plastic bag over his head which was tight and hampered his breathing. Boliev lost consciousness. According to Osman, he was beaten at the militia unit and taken from one office to another. They came to the Boliev's house approximately at 3 p.m. The documents state that he was detained at 5 p.m., the report on discovering arms was signed at 6 p.m. But according to the detained person, the arms were "discovered" at 9 p.m.. In one of the offices of the Khasavyurt traffic inspectorate, in the course of a personal search of the person ostensibly detained for an administrative offence, they "discovered" a grenade in one pocket of Boliev's coat and a fuse in the other pocket. When the traffic militia officers came to his place he was washing his car in the yard and wore working clothes. He went in to change and put on the coat, there was nothing in its pockets as his relatives saw it," relates the lawyer.

"When they beat Osman Boliev at the militia unit there was a bag on his head, and it is impossible to say exactly who was beating him. Probably, these were the militiamen from the mobile group of the RF MIA who had taken part in his detention and the local officers. He was kept at the Khasavyurt traffic inspectorate till November 19, but was only placed to the temporary detention facility at the militia unit on the 17th. One wonders, where had he been for two days? He had not been at the pre-trial prison, or at the detention facility or at home. It seems clear that he had been held at the offices of the traffic militia investigation department. He was registered as detained for an administrative offence but was not placed to the detention facility with other persons detained for administrative offences. The materials of the administrative detention of November 15 last year are attached to the criminal file and the report runs: "in the course of conducting operational search on the territory of the Khasavyurt
town bus station, having noticed the service car, Boliev Osman Ramzanovich behaved as if at a loss. When his identification documents were requested for checking, he started to express dissatisfaction." The materials on the administrative offence have not been submitted to court and no decision on it has been passed to this day. However, if an offence has been committed there must be some punishment or a document on dismissal of the case," states Salimat Kadyrova.

"The file contains two reports on administrative detention of Boliev, compiled in the name of Vitali Shamber and Konstantin Novitskiy, captains of the criminal investigation department of the RF MIA mobile group. The same file contains two interrogation reports, one compiled in the name of Shamber and one in the name of Novitskiy. The reports have been compiled after initiation of the criminal case against Boliev. The signatures of Shamber and Novitskiy in the detention and interrogation reports do not match. It means that the signatures have been forged either in the detention report or in the interrogation report. This is what should be clarified in the court hearings," continues the lawyer.

"My defendant has never given any evidence in the course of the investigation. He refused to do it pursuant to Art. 51 of the RF Constitution. Although Boliev was detained on November 15 under the charge of committing an administrative offence, the lawyer (there was only А. Umaev at the time) was given access to him only from the 17th, from the moment of passing the decision by Khasavyurt internal affairs department investigator on the detention of Osman on November 17, 2005, after the criminal case had been initiated," explains Kadyrova.

"I am sure," claims the defence lawyer, "that the defence platform is 100% strong while the prosecution has no proof whatsoever, except unfounded evidence of captains Shamber and Novitskiy. As far back as on February 13, I filed an application to exclude from the file the evidence obtained with violations of the law: the report on administrative detainment, the report on personal search, the report on administrative offence, the expert opinion of the explosion examination and the statement which registers the fact that Boliev refused to sign the documents on administrative offence. No statement of refusal to sign is envisaged either in the RF Code of Criminal Procedure (CCP) or in the Code of Administrative Offences (CAO). If a person refuses to sign documents compiled under an administrative or criminal case, the document itself must contain an appropriate record that he or she refuses to sign it. It is explicitly written in the CCP and the CAO. However, there are no such records in the documents, there is o
nly one statement on the refusal to sign all the documents."

"The show on the discovery of a grenade on Boliev during the personal search was organized in the presence of the search witnesses. Theirs are the only signatures that are present in the search report which states that a grenade was discovered in the pocket of the Boliev's coat. I have their explanations. The search witnesses promised to speak only the truth in court. It seems that militia officer tried to summon them and influence their testimony. I think that, even if the search witnesses give honest testimonies which do not suit the investigation, the prosecution may claim that they are false and have been shaped under the influence of the defence. No fingerprints have been taken from the grenade. I am going to apply for fingerprints but the application will hardly be granted because the grenade has already been subjected to the explosion expert examination and there will be hardly any fingerprints on it," supposes Salimat Kadyrova. Sergey Brovchenko, the other Boliev's lawyer, even supposes that the searc
h witnesses were in another room at the moment of the personal search of the detainee and the "discovery" of the grenade, and witnessed nothing.

"Osman Boliev was released from custody on February 13 due to deteriorated health. It is the circumstance on which the court based its decision, the fact that he needed hospital treatment. The appropriate conclusion of the doctor is attached to the file. From that time, the defendant has been in the hospital, they transfer him from one department to another, first, he was at the therapeutic department, now he is at the neurological department. The court has granted my application and suspended the hearings until the defendant's health improves. However, the prosecutor's office is dissatisfied with the suspension of the hearings. No one has informed me that the hearing is resumed. The court considered it necessary to suspend the hearings due to the defendant's illness, now he is still in hospital, nothing has changed. How come the court appoints the hearing on March 16? Considering this and some other information which I possess but prefer not to talk about it, I suppose that the court intends to pass a guilty
verdict and I will not be surprised if this is going to be imprisonment. However, there are no grounds for passing a sentence," insists Kadyrova.

"The maximum punishment under this article is 4 years in prison. But the defendant has never been sentenced for criminal charges, he is characterized positively, he has three children, the youngest is 2 years-old, the eldest is 10, his wife does not work, his mother is old and sick. Considering all this, if they send him to prison, even assuming that he is guilty, it is going to be a very heavy sentence," says the lawyer.

The Khasavyurt prosecutor's office considers the release of Boliev from custody illegitimate. Yesterday, on March 15, the Judicial Panel on Criminal Cases under the Dagestan Supreme Court was to consider the cassation application of the prosecutor's office which wants the ruling of the Khasavyurt town court of February 13 on the defendant's release from custody against a recognizance not to leave to be reversed. However, the "Public Verdict" foundation reports to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that they postponed the consideration of the application till next day.

In his cassation application to the Dagestan Supreme Court, of which the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent has a Xerox copy, G. Omarov, Khasavyurt deputy prosecutor, stresses the insufficiency of the medical documents which confirm the necessity to subject O. Boliev to hospital treatment.

" Khasavyurt town court should take into account that Boliev O. R. is charged with a crime envisaged by article 222, part 1 of RF CC where the actual punishment is up to 4 years of prison and a fine, there is no alternative punishment in the article. He has not confessed his guilt, refused to give evidence, is capable of escaping from the investigation and trial. While being free, he may hamper the proceedings, etc.," writes the prosecutor's office.

Additionally, as notices deputy prosecutor Omarov, "in accordance with the expert opinion of Dzhabrailov M. I., chief specialist of the Main Board of the Federal Registration Service in the Republic of Dagestan, the goals and tasks of the Dagestan regional public organization "Romashka" headed by Boliev O. R. point to the fact that it is not a human rights organization because the Charter of the said organization envisages other goals. Consequently, the human rights activity of the "Romashka" organization is not legal."

Salimat Kadyrova hopes that the court will decline the request of the prosecutor's office and let her defendant remain free or, more exactly, on the hospital bed. Boliev has been released from custody more than a month ago and has not escaped. He has not exerted any pressure on the parties in the proceedings. Moreover, he has never been convicted, has three little children, has a place of residence and a job.

The head of the "Romashka" organization connects his health problems with the torture he was subjected to for three days at Khasavyurt militia station following his detention on November 15 of last year, and a three-month stay at the pre-trial prison.

On February 13, Osman Boliev was released from custody upon a petition of the defence lawyers. Sergey Brovchenko, defendant's Moscow lawyer who defends Boliev with the assistance of the Moscow "Public Verdict" foundation, considers that the human rights activist was illegally kept in custody. "The report on the detainment has not been signed even by the person who detained him and found that ammunition was in his pockets. He never gave any testimony during investigation, except once about nothing," said the defence lawyer to the Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

"Osman is only armed with a pen. It is a terrible armament which he used to write to the European Court. I am sure that this is the reason why they initiated a criminal case against him," stated Sergey Brovchenko to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent. "Immediately after his detainment on November 15 last year, he was severely beaten and tortured for four hours. He lost consciousness several times. The militia officers, while beating him, said that "his behaviour is wrong." Then they found a fuse and the body of a grenade in two pockets of his coat," related the lawyer.

Lawyer Salimat Kadyrova told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent yesterday that she had applied to the Khasavyurt prosecutor's office with a request to initiate criminal proceedings against the Dagestan power authority's officers who had been torturing and beating her defendant. However, as it follows from the response of the prosecutor's office, those facts had not been confirmed in the course of a check.

In the opinion of the defence lawyers, the prosecution files contain a number of strange circumstances. "Firstly, the search was conducted not on the place where Boliev was detained, but at the militia station. Logically speaking, Boliev, when he was following the traffic militia car, could have got rid of the grenade parts, but he failed to do so," runs the statement of the "Public Verdict" foundation. "Secondly, the documents submitted to the prosecutor's office lacked a description of the grenade. Thirdly, the documents submitted to the prosecutor's office for initiating a criminal case lacked examination of the search witnesses (such materials of examination were submitted only several days later). Fourthly, the documents submitted to the prosecutor's office for initiating a criminal case lacked the materials on administrative detainment."

A number of experts think that the cause of the Boliev's charge has been his professional activity. The "Romashka" public organization headed by Boliev has been initiator of notorious court proceedings on the case of kidnapping of Dagestan resident Yaraly Israilov on October 19, 2004 by officers of Khasavyurt department of internal affairs. Boliev, along with Karina Moskalenko, head of International Protection Facilitation Centre, compiled and sent a complaint on the case to the European Court on Human Rights. In addition, Boliev publicly disclosed the fact of murder of Summai Abdurashitova, a 6-year old girl, by Dagestan law enforcement officers during a secret operation on arresting suspected criminals. She was killed on March 14, 2005 in her bed in the village of Solnechnoye, Khasavyurt District, by a fragment of a large-calibre shell. A complaint on the case was also filed in the European Court.