Moscow Policeman Admits Falsification of Oppositionist Arrest Report
Artem Charukhin, the Moscow police officer who signed the report that served as a basis for the opposition leader Ilya Yashin's five-day imprisonment, testified in court that the report had been false. Yashin was detained by the police on 31 December 2010 during the opposition demonstration in support of Article 31 of the Russian Constitution (freedom of assembly). Yashin was charged with resisting arrest and was sentenced to five days of “administrative arrest” (short-term imprisonment). After serving the five-day term, Yashin challenged his detention in court contending that he did not resist. Charukhin was called as a witness. When Yashin pointed out that Charukhin’s written report was inconsistent with Charukhin’s own oral testimony and with the video record of the detention, the policeman confessed that he wrote the report based on the dictation of his superior, Senior Lieutenant Burtsev. In answering the judge’s questions, Charukhin said that it was the first time that he had been forced to falsify a report. Two other opposition leaders, Boris Nemtsov and Eduard Limonov, were also detained the same day and were each sentenced to 15-day prison terms.
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