A criminal case under article 306 of the Criminal Code of Russia ("Wilful false accusation") was opened against a prisoner Eduard Gorbunov, who reported on torture in the Custody centre No. 6 in the city of Omutninsk in the Kirov region, as reported by the deputy chairman of the Kirov region Public Monitoring Commission Artur Abashev, who visited the Custody centre No. 6 with a check.
According to Artur Abashev, he has already voiced his concerns for the fact that Gorbunov could be prosecuted on-air of the radio station Ekho Moskvy in Kirov: "I appealed to the Investigation Committee staff not to prosecute the convicts for reports on torture. Unfortunately, they did not listen to my words. This is not the first time when in the Kirov region cases are brought against convicts for their reports on unlawful acts of penitentiary employees".
The information on the criminal case initiation in Custody centre No. 6 was confirmed by the Regional Investigative Committee press office, but they refused to give away the details.
"The statement of the case is as follows. Since the facts from his replication were not confirmed, there automatically goes Article 306 [of the Criminal Code, “Deliberately false denunciation”]. This article is about enormous offence, one can get a penal up to eight years of imprisonment", Gorbunov's lawyer Natalya Kruglikova explained to the "7x7" reporter. Now she is waiting for her client to get familiarized with the case papers on the refusal to initiate criminal proceedings on torture, so then to challenge it.
In February 2017, the relatives of the convicted Eduard Gorbunov disseminated his video message about torture in the Omutninsk custody centre. He claims that the penitentiary officers mocked him, he got beaten, raped with various objects, and forced to wear women's clothes.
