The text of court ruling handed over to human rights activist acquitted in Dagestan

" To acquit... owing to the innocence of the defendant of committing the crime... The material evidence, i.e. RGN grenade (without a fuse), shall be destroyed upon the ruling coming into force, " runs the court ruling passed on May 18 by Khasavyurt town court (Dagestan) on the criminal case of human rights activist O. Boliev charged with illegal acquisition, storage and carrying of fire-arms. The full text of the ruling was handed to Boliev only yesterday. He passed a copy of it to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

 "The criminal case has been dropped with regard to Boliev, but the grenade was found, after all. I asked the court to stop the proceedings owing to the absence of the criminal event, but the judge stopped the proceedings due to failure to establish the person who had committed the crime," says Sergei Brovchenko, lawyer of Osman Boliev to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent. From art. 24, para. 4, of the Code of Criminal Procedure it follows that the criminal proceedings on the fact of finding a grenade thus may not be dropped and the investigation seems to be obliged to continue looking for the offender. But it is not clear what other offender can be looked for within this criminal case which was obviously initiated against a concrete person. It will be all the more impossible if the grenade, i.e. the material evidence, is destroyed. It seems that the judge's verdict has been wrongly formulated.

"The ruling may be called a partial victory. It still can be appealed against by the prosecutor's office and we shall see how the situation will develop with regard to the investigation of the circumstances pointed out by the defence, i.e. the crimes committed by the militiamen and Bitarov, Khasavyurt magistrate. For reference, Osman Boliev and Sergei Brovchenko, his lawyer, had applied to the RF General Prosecutor's office, the prosecutor's office of the Republic of Dagestan, the Supreme Court and the judicial qualification chamber of Dagestan with a request to bring the magistrate judge of section No. 35 of Khasavyurt, who had falsified the decision with regard to Boliev, to criminal and disciplinary responsibility. They had also launched an appeal to the town prosecutor against the decision to decline the initiation of a criminal case on torture of Osman Boliev described in the article by Anna Politkovskaya in the "Novaya Gazeta" newspaper.

For reference, on November 15, 2005, Osman Boliev, resident of Khasavyurt, stood by his brother's car parked near his house. He was approached by traffic militiamen who, claiming that the Boliev's car resembled a car reported to be stolen, suggested that he should follow them to the militia station for checking. Boliev took the wheel to follow the traffic militia car in the direction of the local department of internal affairs. However, on the way there the Boliev's car was stopped by soldiers of the RF MIA mobile investigation unit. The traffic militia officers handed Boliev over to the mobile squad militiamen and drove off. In their turn, the latter placed O. Boliev into their car, put a bag over his head, handcuffed him and took him to the Khasavyurt department of internal affairs. According to the human rights activist, while in militia, they had been torturing him for several hours, then searched him and "discovered" a dismantled grenade on him.

Initially, they tried to charge Boliev with involvement in an illegal armed unit. On November 16, 2005, already the next day following the arrest, the "Dagestan" news agency, citing the Dagestan MIA press-service, reported that O. Boliev, active participant of illegal armed units, had been detained in Khasavyurt. According to law enforcement agencies, he was member of the group of Abdulsheikhov Arslanbek killed in Moscow's "Nord-Ost" theatre in 2003. The report also ran that security agencies possessed information on the detainee's involvement in combat actions against federal forces on the territory of the Chechen Republic and that during arrest of the "militant," "an RGD-5 grenade with a fuse was found on him and confiscated."

"Boliev was searched not on the spot of the arrest but in the department of internal affairs building. Logically thinking, when following the traffic militia car, Boliev could have easily got rid of the grenade parts, but he did not do this, stated the "Public Verdict" foundation. The documents submitted to the prosecutor's office for the initiation of criminal proceedings lacked the grenade description, interrogations of the witnesses who attended the search (the interrogation materials were submitted only a few days later), and the materials of the administrative detention." Notably, while the investigator of the Boliev's case sent an GRD-5 grenade for expert examination, the expert returned his opinion on the "RGN (Afghani) grenade." Lawyer Salimat Kadyrova, while talking to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent, assumed that the grenade had been changed due to the fact that it had already been "exposed" somewhere.

A number of experts think that the main cause of the Boliev's detention and 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 Dagestan resident Yaraly Israilov on October 19, 2004 by officers of Khasavyurt department of internal affairs. Boliev, along with Karina Moskalenko, commissar of International Lawyers' Commission and 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 the fragment of a large-calibre shell. A complaint on the case was also filed in the European Court.

The "Memorial" human rights centre stated on March 16 that "the criminal prosecution of Osman Boliev in Dagestan is clearly politically motivated."