Odesa - Prosecutors in Odesa have concluded an investigation into a compliant filed by Adam Osmayev, the chief suspect in the criminal inquiry into Russian President Vladimir Putin's attempted assassination, and found no evidence of the torture that Osmayev claimed to have been subjected to during the pre-trial investigation.
The Odesa regional prosecutor’s office closed the case in the absence of elements essential to the offence, Osmayev’s wife Amina Okuyeva told reporters before court hearings.
Okuyeva also said that the investigation had been conducted formally, and that officers of the Alfa special police force were not questioned, allegedly because “they cannot be questioned.”
Interfax is getting in touch with prosecutors for commentaries.
It was reported earlier that Adam Osmayev was detained in Odesa on February 4, 2012 on the suspicion of having carried out a bomb attack on Tyraspolska Street earlier the same day. The blast killed 26-year-old Russian citizen Ruslan Madayev and seriously injured Ilya Pyanzin, a 28-year-old citizen of Kazakhstan.
The Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office later forwarded the criminal case opened by the police on charges of “careless handling of weapons, ammunition, or explosives” to the Ukrainian Security Service department for the Odesa region. It turned out that investigators had found elements of improvised explosive devices at the scene of the explosion. Pyanzin was also detained and began to actively cooperate with the investigation.
The Ukrainian Security Service confirmed on February 27 that Osmayev and Pyanzin had plotted to murder Putin after the presidential elections in Russia scheduled for March 2012 and that Ukrainian and Russian intelligence services had thwarted the alleged plan.
Russia asked Ukraine in summer 2012 to hand over Osmayev and Pyanzin, but the men’s defense lawyers contested the prosecutor’s decision on their extradition. Despite the fact that the courts upheld the extradition to Russia, the delay enabled Osmayev’s lawyers to file a claim contesting his extradition with the European Court of Human Rights. The lawyers for Pyanzin prepared to file a similar claim but failed to do so before Pyanzin was extradited to Russia in late August 2012. In Russia, he recanted the evidence he had given in Ukraine.
The investigation into the criminal case involving Osmayev was completed in the fall of 2012. On November 16, an indictment was approved, which was sent to the Odesa Primorsky District Court. A private hearing of the case was held on December 5. The court then declined the request made by Osmayev’s defense lawyers for a further investigation. The first hearing of the case was held on December 24.
The lawyers for Osmayev have complained more than once that the Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were restricting his right to defense. Osmayev also said he had been pressured by investigators from the Ukrainian Security Service.
