Alexey Pichugin refuses to see human rights advocates
Citing a member of the Moscow Public Monitoring Commission (PMC) which oversees prisoner rights in the city’s investigative jails, Kommersant newspaper reports that members of the PMC failed four times to meet with Alexey Pichugin, who was unexpectedly moved from Black Dolphin Correctional Facility No. 6 in Orenburg Region to Moscow’s Lefortovo jail last July.
First, there were the penitentiary system’s coronavirus-related restrictions, then jail staff denied the human rights advocates a visit with Pichugin saying it was Mr. Pichugin’s own decision. The overseers found these impediments suspicious, and during a regularly scheduled visit to Lefortovo they managed to get permission to talk to Pichugin in person, at least through the jail cell door. But that conversation never happened either: without even coming to the small food service window in the cell door, Alexey Pichugin yelled that he will have no contact with the visitors.
The human rights advocates again tried to see him a couple days ago, but didn’t even make it past the Lefortovo administrative office. However, a guard gave the PMC members a written note from Alexey Pichugin stating that he asks the jail administration to shield him from any contact with public overseers, regardless of who it is and why they want to see him.
It is thus still unclear why Alexey Pichugin was brought to Moscow and why he’s been held in the investigative jail the last six months. Russian Investigative Committee and Federal Penitentiary Administration’s official representatives that Kommersant tried to contact for an explanation refused to discuss this topic in principle. Mr. Pichugin’s current lawyer Dmitry Kharlamov of Orenburg Regional law offices did not wish to comment on the situation either. He just said he visits his client in Moscow once in a while, but mainly helps him with everyday issues. Defense attorney Kharlamov says that if Alexey Pichugin talks to law enforcement, it’s without the lawyer’s participation.
Source: Kommersant
