On December 25, 2002, the Supreme Court panel, chaired by judge Z. F. Galliulin, upheld the decision of the Moscow City court, in which it agreed with the FSB demand to keep Igor Sutyagin in jail pending trial. The defense argued that the FSB failed to present any evidence that would justify the continuing detention. As it is the custom in the Russian Supreme Court, the court did not present explaination of its decision. The full text of the ruling with supporting arguments will be released in about a week.
On December 25, 2002 the Russian Supreme Court will consider the appeal of Igor Sutyagin’s defense, which challenges the legality of his detention. The appeal that will be considered by the Supreme Court on Wednesday is the result of an earlier motion, in which the defense argued that the FSB has to somehow justify the continuing imprisonment of Sutyagin. In the past, the FSB has consistently refused to provide any such justification, arguing that it can keep Sutyagin in jail just because it is accusing him of a grave crime. In October 2002 the Supreme Court found this practice illegal and demanded that the FSB provides evidence to support of continuing detention.
In response to the October 2002 Supreme Court ruling, the FSB produced a document, which it claims proves that Sutyagin may flee the country if released from jail. The document in question is a piece of paper produced by the Kaluga FSB office that claims that according to FSB information Sutyagin has “an open visa in the Italian Embassy” (which is a concept not known outside of the FSB). The defense argues that apart from the apparently false claims contained in this document, it can have no legal power and therefore could not be used to justify Igor’s detention.
During two days in October 2002, there were several court hearings on legality of Igor's pretrial detention.
On October 2 the Russian Supreme court rejected the earlier decision of the Moscow city court that extended pretrial detention until October 8, 2002. The Supreme court, however, left Igor in jail.
Quite unexpectedly, the Moscow city court decided to correct its record right away and held the hearings the next day, on October 3rd. Sutyagin’s lawyers said they did not quite expect this turn of events when they arrived to the court that day to argue their other appeal (of which later). The FSB, in contrast, was fully aware of the court’s plans and showed up with what it believes is evidence of Sutyagin’s intention to flee the country if freed from jail. The FSB stated that Sutyagin has “an open visa to Italy”, which he would use to escape. Although this claim is absolutely absurd, for the visa in question was received by Sutyagin shortly before his arrest in October 1999 and expired in about two weeks, the court did not ask for anything else and ruled that Igor Sutyagin will stay in jail, reversing the Supreme court decision of one day earlier. The defense will again appeal the Moscow city court’s decision.
After that, the Moscow city court consider another appeal of the defense—the one that was originally scheduled to be considered on October 3rd. The appeal questions extending detention period beyond October 8th. On October 4th the Moscow city court announced its decision: Igor Sutyagin will stay in jail. The defense will appeal this ruling.
In the end of June 2002 the case of Igor Sutyagin was handed over from the Kaluga FSB to the central FSB Department of Investigations in Moscow. On June 27th, Igor Sutyagin was transferred to the FSB prison in Lefortovo, Moscow, from Kaluga prison, where he had been held for more than two and a half years.
Sutyagin’s defense believes that by transferring the case to Moscow, the FSB wants to put additional pressure on the court that will be hearing the case later this year. The FSB apparently hopes that by raising the stakes and involving the central FSB office into the investigation it will make it much more difficult for the court to acquit Sutyagin. In addition to this, the FSB gets legal ground for moving the future trial to the Moscow city court, which has proven to be quite reliable in rendering guilty verdicts in earlier “spy trials” no matter how weak the case presented by the FSB was.
The maximum term for pre-trial detention, 18 months (this time does not include the time the case was in court), will be reached in the beginning of October. According to Sutyagin’s defense estimates, the FSB will do everything to complete investigation by that time, since keeping Sutyagin in jail is a very powerful means of pressuring the court and the public opinion. The FSB is apparently counting on the fact that the more time Sutyagin spends in jail the more reluctant would be the court to acquit him. The trial is expected to begin in October-November 2002.
The case reached the Kaluga FSB, which resumed the investigation. The FSB will have to finish the investigation no later than September 2002 and submit the case to the court no later than October 2002.
The defense will appeal the Kaluga court and Supreme Court rulings to the Presidium of the Supreme Court. You could support Igor Sutyagin by writing a letter to the Supreme Court or joining the campaign run by the American Association for Advancement of Science.
The panel of Supreme Court judges considered the appeal of the defense at its March 20, session. The panel, which consisted of Z. F. Galliulin (chair), A. S. Kolyshnitsin, and S. A. Lamintseva, upheld the decision of the Kaluga court to send the case for further investigation. The Supreme Court judges agreed with the Kaluga court that the failure of the FSB to present proper charges and numerous violations of procedure violated Igor Sutyagin's right to defend himself. However, instead of terminating the case the Supreme Court agreed that the FSB should be given another chance to fabricate the case. The Supreme Court upheld the Kaluga court decision to send the case for further investigation and leave Igor in jail.
It took judge Galliullin and his colleagues more than two weeks to write a formal decision in which they were expected to present their arguments (here is the full text of the decision in Russian). Still, the decision did not have any arguments that would answer any of the questions posed by the defense in its appeal (here is the full text of the appeal in Russian).
For example, the defense pointed out that the Kaluga court did not give any explanation as to why Igor Sutyagin should be kept in jail. One would expect that in this situation the Supreme Court, since it decides to uphold that decision, would present some arguments to support it. But the Supreme Court simply stated that the decision to keep Igor in jail is correct, without any explanation.
The Kaluga court sent the case of Igor Sutyagin, a researcher with the Institute of U.S. and Canada Studies, accused by the FSB of treason, to further investigation. Igor Sutyagin will remain in jail.
The court has found that during the investigation the FSB admitted “substantial violations of legal procedure, which deprived [Igor Sutyagin] of his constitutional right to defend himself.”
The court has also determined that the charges against Sutyagin are not specific. In particular, the investigators did not specify what were the secrets that Sutyagin was allegedly giving to foreigners. The court found that all expert opinions presented by the FSB are based on the Decree No. 55 of the Ministry of Defense, which was not properly registered and therefore can not be used for prosecution.
In short, what the court has found was that the case against Sutyagin was fabricated by the FSB and the charges have no factual or legal foundation.
In any other country, these findings would have led to an acquittal. In Russia, not only the FSB is getting a second chance in fabricating its charges, but Igor Sutyagin will be kept in jail for many more months (he has spent more than two years in jail already).
The defense will appeal today’s decision of the Kaluga court to the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation. The defense sees absolutely no reason why the case should continue to exist and why Igor Sutyagin should be kept in jail.
During the final arguments the defense demanded his unconditional acquittal. After hearing the arguments the court announced a break until December 25th. When the court reconvenes, Igor Sutyagin will address the court with his final word. The verdict is expected before the end of December.
The defense demonstrated that the prosecution did not present any evidence that would indicate Igor Sutyagin's guilt. Sutyagin has never had access to any classified information and all he was doing was a scientific analysis of openly available newspapers and journals. The FSB built its whole case on the presumption that analyzing open sources constitutes a crime and the defense again reiterated its long-standing position that the FSB allegations have no foundation in the law.
The defense argued that the prosecution did not present any evidence that would indicate Igor Sutyagin's guilt. Sutyagin has never had access to any classified information and all he was doing was a scientific analysis of openly available newspapers and journals. The FSB built its whole case on the presumption that analyzing open sources constitutes a crime and the defense again reiterated its long-standing position that the FSB allegations have no foundation in the law.
The defense's arguments were supported by the recent Supreme Court ruling, which declared that the decree of the Minister of Defense No. 55 is illegal and can not be used in prosecution since it has never been published. This is the decree that was used by the numerous "experts" summoned by the FSB to allege that the information the Sutyagin was reading in open newspapers was secret. Every one of these "experts" used the Decree No. 55 to justify his conclusions. Now that the Supreme Court declared the decree void, the FSB could not even pretend that it has a case against Sutyagin.
The Russian constitution explicitly prohibits using secret decrees to prosecute citizens or limit their rights. The Supreme Court ruling just confirmed what has been obvious for a long time--the charges brought by the FSB against Sutyagin are bogus and have been bogus from the very beginning. Unfortunately, in modern Russia FSB still can ignore the constitution, law, and the requirements of due process. It is not clear yet if the Supreme Court could stop this practice.
When the trial resumed on October 29, 2001, Igor Sutyagin and his defense made a number of statements, pointing out again that the prosecution has failed to present any evidence of any unlawful activity. On November 1st the court the prosecutor addressed the court. It is not clear why the prosecutor needed five weeks to prepare his address. He simply read out the charges prepared by the FSB a year ago and did not made any attempt to address the inconsistencies in those charges during the trial. The prosecutor said for the record that he is not interested in listening to the defense's arguments. Apparently, as far as the prosecutor is concerned, the trial is a completely unnecessary part of the process. Concluding his speech, the prosecutor asked the court to sentence Igor Sutyagin to 14 years in prison.
The trial will enter the final stage on October 29, 2001. On September 21, 2001 the court finished with studying materials of the case and witnesses testimonies. The prosecutor then asked five weeks to prepare his arguments.
The fact that the prosecution needs that much time to prepare the accusation demonstrates the weakness of the case against Igor Sutyagin. Indeed, the prosecutor will have to assemble the arguments almost from scratch, for the FSB has failed to present any evidence of Sutyagin’s guilt. Lacking any evidence, the FSB has built the case against Sutyagin on opinions of experts from the FSB and Ministry of Defense (read more about it >>).
All the experts that testified against Igor Sutyagin, claiming that his work contain classified information, based their conclusions on the Decree No. 55 of the Minister of Defense, which determines categories of data that can be considered secret (the Russian Supreme Court in its decision of September 12th, 2001 admitted that some of the provisions of this decree contradict the law). It should be noted that the decree itself is secret and the prosecution failed to explain how Sutyagin, who has never had security clearance, could determine whether the information he comes across is classified or not.
The court denied Igor Sutyagin or his defense access to the decree that is used as a foundation of the prosecution. The court would not even let Sutyagin to read the provisions of the Decree No. 55 that were used by the experts. Instead, the judge read the relevant provisions aloud. If this is not a mockery of justice then what is?
In the last days before the current break, the FSB stepped up its efforts to put pressure on Igor Sutyagin and on the court. In an unprecedented step, the FSB guards would not let Igor talk to his lawyers before a formal opening of the trial or during the breaks in the proceedings. The judge was unable or unwilling to call the FSB to order and as a result, Igor Sutyagin and his attorneys have to ask a formal approval of the judge every time they want to talk.
In another intimidating (and rather nasty and cruel) step taken by the FSB and approved by the court, Sutyagin's lawyers were prohibited from giving him vitamins or any other medicine. Until recently the vitamins were given to Igor regularly to support his health, deteriorated during eighteen months in harsh prison conditions. Now the court stopped this practice, certainly not because it is concerned about Igor's health.
As it turned out, one of the documents that the FSB holds central to its case is a paper that Igor Sutyagin wrote at a request of FSB Colonel Ageyev, an FSB representative at the U.S. and Canada Institute, in summer 1999. Colonel Ageyev asked Igor Sutyagin to write him a paper on the Moscow ABM system, which Igor did. Now the FSB uses this paper, which did not go further than the FSB, to accuse Sutyagin of espionage.
This situation is already absurd, without even taking into account that the report was based on openly available information. However, the FSB has managed to make it even more absurd.
The document that the FSB presented in court as the report written by Igor Sutyagin is apparently different from the copy that the FSB had at the beginning of the investigation. It is printed on a different printer with different fonts etc. It is not clear yet if the contents was altered, but given that the FSB invested so much into this document, it won't be surprising if it was. Something like this has been done by the FSB in other cases (for example, the case of Valentin Moiseyev), so there is nothing that would prevent the FSB from doing this in this case.
Igor's testimony before the court made it absolutely clear that the FSB has no evidence whatsoever to support its accusations. Sutyagin prepared a list of mistakes and outright falsifications made by the FSB in the charges. This list alone runs for five hundred pages. In his testimony Igor called the charges against him "unlawful and absurd."
Desperate to find something that might keep the case alive, the prosecutor claimed that there are "discrepancies" between the testimonies that Igor gave during the investigation and in court. Igor and his defense found no disagreement, but the court decided to read all the investigation protocols.
At the beginning of the August 13th, 2001 court session it became clear that Igor Sutyagin has serious flu. The defense asked the court to call for a doctor, but judge Gusev denied this request. Igor was sent back to jail, where he was examined by a doctor. The doctor diagnosed him with flu. As a result, on its August 14th session, the court postponed hearings.
The result of the trail so far was that the prosecution failed to provide any evidence of any of Sutyagin's alleged wrongdoing and demonstrated very clearly that it does not have any evidence to support its accusations. The FSB has built its case completely on various "expert opinions", most of which are of more than questionable quality.
The main claim made by the "experts" is that Sutyagin could not obtain the information he had from open sources. Given that the prosecution has not mentioned any classified sources that Sutyagin may have had access to, such claims demonstrate nothing but incompetence of the "experts", who apparently have no idea at all what kind of information is publicly available.
The court hearings also demonstrated very clearly that the prosecution does not have any evidence that would support its claim that the company Igor Sutyagin worked with, Alternative Futures, has any connection to any of the intelligence services. The only evidence that the FSB presented in the court was an opinion of another "expert", this time from the FSB itself. He claimed that, in his opinion, the behavior of Alternative Futures makes it plausible that this company has some connection to an intelligence service. However, when asked directly, he admitted that an ordinary commercial company would have behaved exactly the same way.
The "evidence", presented by the prosecution, makes it absolutely clear that the case against Igor Sutyagin was fabricated and all the FSB could base its case on are "expert opinions" by its own "experts".
During the hearings the court found out that the FSB is not even capable of properly fabricating a case. Many "expert opinions" contained serious mistakes and the "experts" had to correct their conclusions more than once during the trial.
If the court does not request new expert opinions, the trial will most likely conclude by the and of August.
The Russian Supreme Court in its February 7, 2001 decision failed to upheld the law and joined the Kaluga regional court in its unlawful practice. The problem is very simple. According to the article 223 of the Criminal Procedure Code, a motion to call additional witnesses that is filed before the court decides on the date of the hearings, should be graned "in all cases", which means that the judge has no right to deny such a motion. However, judge Gusev of the Kaluga regional court denied such a motion. This was an unlawful act and it is very unfortunate that the Russian Supreme Court upheld this unlawful decision. The defense will appeal this decision.
At the request of the defense team, which now includes three lawyers, the judge agreed to adjourn the court until February 26 so that Igor Sutyagin and his lawyers could carefully review the charges.
Meanwhile, the FSB is spreading disinformation about Igor Sutyagin and his case.
On December 14 the judge announced that the trial will begin on December 26, 2000. It should be noted that the according to the Russian law, the court has to set the date of trial no later than 14 days after it receives a case. In this case it took the judge almost seven weeks to set the date of trial.
Vladimir Vasiltsov and Boris Kuznetsov, the lawyers who represent Igor Sutyagin, held a press-conference in the National Press Institute in Moscow.
The U.S. and Canada Institute decided to appoint a public defender to support Igor Sutyagin during the trial.
Human Rights Action Network of the American Association for the Advancement of Science opened a page devoted to Igor Sutyagin's case.
The case is handed to the Kaluga regional court. Judge Alexandr Gusev, who will hear the case, has two weeks to set the date of the trial.
On September 26, eleven months after the case No. 52 was opened, the FSB completed the investigation of the case against Igor Sutyagin. Now he will be presented with formal charges and will get the chance to read the material of the case. At the same time, Igor Sutyagin remains in jail, as the Deputy Prosecutor General once again granted the FSB ther right to extend the investigation, this time to October 26th.
On September 25 the FSB returned the materials taken at the time of arrest to Igor's family, with the exception of some papers and two computers.
Princeton University objects the way the FSB treated its student. The President of Princeton University writes to the President of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
During their visit to Moscow in July 2000, representatives of international press freedom groups cited Sutyagin's case among troubling developments that tell about problems with freedom of press in Russia.
Deputy Prosecutor General once again granted the FSB the right extend the investigation. This time it is extended until September 26, 2000. Igor Sutyagin is still in jail.
The FSB reveals that it is going to accuse Sutyagin of a crime that doesn't exist in the Russian Criminal Code. In an interview that the Director of the U.S. and Canada Institute, Sergey Rogov, gave to Nezavisimaya Gazeta, he said that "the investigators told us that Igor is being accused of passing to foreigners information that can damage Russia's security interests." Apparently the FSB tried to convince Dr. Rogov, that "the Criminal Code says that if you pass information to foreigners and get paid for it, then it doesn't matter if the information contains state secrets." Needless to say, the Criminal Code doesn't contain anything like this. See also a response to Rogov's interview.
A court hearing of a motion that challenges the extension of the investigation took place in Kaluga. The judge upheld the prosecutor deputy's decision to grant the FSB the right to extend the investigation until July 26. Igor Sutyagin stays in jail.
Ryazan Memorial Society and Ryazan Helsinki Group opened a web page about Sutyagin's case (in Russian). Igor's relatives also opened a web site with information about the case
It has became known that the FSB has been investigating Sutyagin's role in a study of civil-military relations, undertaken by two Canadian universities. Canadian academics consider FSB charges "nonsensical".
Deputy General Prosecutor Alexander Ryazanov granted the FSB the right to extend the investigation by three more months. According to the Russian law, the Deputy Prosecutor General could extend the investigation by six months. After that, the FSB will have to go to the General Prosecutor.
The FSB brought formal (although not detailed) charges against Igor Sutiagin. He was accused of treason (Article 275 of the Russian Criminal Code). This article carries a penalty of a twelve to twenty years in prison.
In another development that day, Joshua Handler left Moscow. He was "forced" to leave Moscow by "coordinated" efforts of FSB and U.S. Counsel General. The former started openly following Joshua around Moscow, harrasing his friends as they did so. The latter invited Joshua to the Embassy on Thursday, November 4th and rather forcefully recommended him to leave.
The FSB conducted another search at Pavel Podvig's office. They apparently were not searching for anything new. Rather, they just finished the work they began on October 27th.
During the search, the FSB seized all the copies of the book "Russian Strategic Nuclear Weapons" that they found during the first search.
Igor Sutiagin was held at the Obninsk FSB office from the morning of October 27th until late night October 29th. The FSB apparently questioned him as a witness.
Although Igor was not detained, he was "strongly discouraged from leaving" in an apparent attempt to deny him access to a lawyer (under the Russian law a person has no right to a lawyer unless he is formally detained). At the same time, on Thursday, October 28th, Igor was allowed to call his relatives and friends.
This ambiguous situation ended on October 29th late night, when Igor Sutiagin was arrested and transferred to the Kaluga detention center. Although the FSB did not bring formal charges agains him at that point, the reason for the arrest was that the FSB declared Igor a suspect of treason.
At 8am, officers of the Kaluga regional department of the Federal Security Service (FSB) came to Igor Sutyagin's apartment in Obninsk, Kaluga region. The officers presented a search warrant and began a search at Igor's apartment. His wife, Irina, was present during the search that took most of the rest of the day.
Igor was escorted to the Obninsk FSB office, where he was questioned as witness to the criminal case No.52, open by the Kaluga regional FSB office on the ground of revealing state secrets. It should be noted that at that point Igor was not arrested, nor the FSB brought any charges against him.
Later that day the FSB began searches at Igor Sutiagin's office at the U.S. and Canada Institute in Moscow, at the Moscow apartment of Joshua Handler, and at the office of Pavel Podvig. These searches were apparently a coordinated effort, since they all began at around 4:30pm.
Joshua Handler is a U.S. researcher, who was in Moscow working at the U.S. and Canada Institute since June 1999. Joshua Handler is a Ph.D. student at the Princeton University, and his visit to Russia was a part of an academic exchange program. Igor Sutyagin was apparently responsible for the logistics of Joshua's visit.
During the search at Joshua Handler's apartment, that lasted about 7 hours, the FSB seized his laptop computer, floppy disks, films, and various research materials. Although the FSB officers did ask Joshua some questions, he was not formally interrogated. Neither did the FSB indicate that he is going to be accused of some wrongdoing.
Pavel Podvig, whose office was also searched, is a Russian citizen. He is a researcher at the Center for Arms Control Studies in Moscow. Pavel Podvig was an editor of the book "Russian Strategic Nuclear Weapons", which was published in Moscow in October 1998. Igor Sutiagin was one of the contributors of the book and continued to work with Pavel Podvig on follow-on projects.
During the search at Podvig's office, the FSB confiscated his research materials and the computers that belong to the Center for Arms Control Studies. The FSB officers also sealed all the copies of the book "Russian Strategic Nuclear Weapons" that they found during the search. After finishing the search at the office, the FSB proceeded to Pavel Podvig's apartment.
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