21-year-old dies in Kyiv Remand Prison, supposedly electrocuted

Following a report on his Facebook  page by TVi journalist Konstyantin Usov, the State Penitentiary Service has issued a statement on its website regarding the death of a young man last night, 24 January. As can be seen below this diverges considerably from the journalist’s report.

The Penitentiary Service states that on 24 January, at around 22.20 in one of the cells of the Kyiv SIZO [remand prison] a person (born 1991) arrested on suspicion of committing theft was electrocuted.

The statement asserts that after receiving information from the duty officers, a SIZO operational team arrived within three minutes, with this including the duty medical officer. The person was given emergency medical assistance. At the same time, an ambulance was called which arrived at 22.55 and declared the young man dead.

The report states that an investigative group from the Ministry of Internal Affairs was called, and the Prosecutor’s Office has been informed.

Konstyantin Usov writes that “a person whose guilt had not been confirmed by any court lay on the floor in convulsions for 40 minutes. … In response to the endless cries from cellmates, the drunk medical personnel of the prison simply glanced thought the opening for food and laughed.

Usov says that the man died having not received any assistance and that his sources in the SIZO Administration say that a decision has been taken to produce documents claiming that he received a fatal electric shock.

The State Penitentiary Service’s statement came after Usov’s claims were reported by a number of media outlets.