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war crimes in Ukraine

The Tribunal for Putin (T4P) global initiative was set up in response to the all-out war launched by Russia against Ukraine in February 2022.

MILITIA

21.05.2000   
Frequent publications about torture applied to our citizens, who had the ill luck to come in touch with out valiant militia, made the independent Cherkassy newspaper. Fakty. carry out a public poll. The newspaper turned to the citizens who on their own experience know the methods of law-enforcers and to law-enforcers themselves with the following questions: Is it true that militiamen apply beating? How far may law-enforcers go in applying force? What (who) can stop them?
Frequent publications about torture applied to our citizens, who had the ill luck to come in touch with out valiant militia, made the independent Cherkassy newspaper. Fakty. carry out a public poll. The newspaper turned to the citizens who on their own experience know the methods of law-enforcers and to law-enforcers themselves with the following questions:

Is it true that militiamen apply beating?

How far may law-enforcers go in applying force?

What (who) can stop them?

Here are some instructive answers.

Viktor K.
Condemned for theft (conditionally) after 4 months in a preliminary prison:

. They do beat! From the moment of detention they press on you morally and physically. The vocabulary of the investigators contains exclusively expressions of the type:. Out with it, you motherfucker!.,. Stick your rights to your ass, you, bastard!.,. You. ll confess what you never done, you, brute!. Any mention of one. s rights makes them furious. No one can stop this.

Oleg N.
Never tried, twice detained. for the appearance in a public place in a drunken state. :

. Militia patrols treat our citizens as if they were a patrol of occupying troops. God save you from any protests or mentioning your rights. you will be clubbed and handcuffed. Then you will be taken to the sobering-up station where they will. examine. you as to the degree of the intoxication, of which procedure they have the most approximate ideas. To complain against militia is as stupid as to piss against the wind. I tried.

Stanislav K.
Twice condemned. Spent 6.5 years in penitentiaries:

. Cops cannot fancy how to talk with a detained without using fists. Their professionalism is zero. They have little time for detection and their work is assessed by disclosing crimes. So the only way left is to beat out a confession. In their arithmetic the crime is considered disclosed not when the man is sentenced, but when they squeeze a confession from him. How far can they go? As far as they wish, there are no limits. To stop beatings is impossible since the needed laws are absent. The only way out is to sign everything they wish. Otherwise they will beat you to death.

Senior lieutenant V.,
a detective:

. Militiamen have no restrictive factors prohibiting them to apply force. On the contrary, that who does not beat causes suspicion from colleagues and commanders. The reason is one. the index of disclosures, i.e. the proportion of confessions. As to other proofs, that is not what a detective must get. I do not remember a single case when someone was made responsible for brutal methods. How to stop it? To exchange the personnel. By 100%.

Mykhaylo Skobets,
a lawyer of the newspaper. Fakty., stayed 8.5 months in a preliminary prison, found non-guilty by the court:

. They did not risk to apply illegal methods of the ODA to me. They pressed by trifles: a parcel was lost, a meeting was not permitted and so on. But I saw and I know. During 22 years of lawyer. s work I witnessed much.

Application of force is a routine in our militia. One may be beaten by a cop, or by a detective, or by a convoy, or by a guard of the preliminary prison, or even by your brother convict. The reason is one: in our country a human being, its life and health never existed as a value. No one ever was responsible for arbitrary and cruel actions. They may injure you physically and morally. there are no restrictions. The brain of an average law-enforcer is not contaminated with such nonsense as human rights or the presumption of innocence. And if you want to explain to a cop that it is you, a tax payer, who supports him, and not a state, and that he must guard you even if you return from a wedding, then you must have an oxygen bag, since the cop may faint from astonishment. Compare: if you put into the cellar your mother-in-law to prevent her to bother your watching a football match on TV, you will get up to three years for an illegal detention; a militiaman also may be sentenced for this, but only up to one year, under the irreal condition that you have enough health to prove the illegality of the detention.

To stop the arbitrary actions under the existing system is impossible. The authorities do not have objective or subjective reasons to stop torture. Different things happen. For example, in the town of Smilia a new head of the district department, O.Chuprin, came and tried to stop cruel treatment. It reduced, but laws, not people must rule the state. Alas, there are no laws.
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