In November 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin fired the head of the Federal Penitentiary Service, Alexander Kalashnikov. This happened after a scandal caused by the publication of video recordings of torture of prisoners in pre-trial detention centers, colonies and a prison hospital in the Saratov region. However, experts believe that the director of the FSIN "suffered" not for the outrages committed in his department, but for allowing a leak. His predecessor was also fired after a similar scandal related to torture in the Yaroslavl colony. FSB officer Kalashnikov was replaced by Arkady Gostev from a "competing firm" - the Ministry of Internal Affairs. The leadership is changing, but information about inhuman torture and mysterious deaths continues to come from prisons.

Chechnya. "I am not going to commit suicide"

On May 28, 40-year-old Khavazhi Magomadov died in the temporary detention facility of the Staropromyslovsky District Department of Internal Affairs in Grozny. He was serving a 25-year sentence for a number of serious crimes, including an attack on security forces and participation in an illegal armed group. He was transferred to Chechnya from a maximum security prison in Kuzbass, allegedly to testify as a witness in another criminal case. He assumed that in fact he was being taken to Grozny for reprisals and further torture, and on the eve of the transfer he wrote a statement: "I have not committed any crimes. If I incriminate myself, this will mean that I was forced to confess to this using violence and blackmail. I am a deeply religious person, a Muslim, and I do not intend to commit suicide; my religion does not allow me to do so. I appeal to human rights activists and regulatory authorities with a request to monitor my case and, if necessary, distribute it in the media, to which I give my consent." On May 27, a non-working Saturday, he was taken to the Staropromyslovsky police department from SIZO-1. There, an identification procedure took place - a certain witness in a mask and hat pointed to Magomadov as the person from whom he allegedly bought a weapon 19 years ago. After that, Magomadov spoke to a lawyer, said that he felt well, was taking medication for tuberculosis. He was left in the temporary detention facility for the night. On the morning of May 28, a doctor was called there, who confirmed his death. According to the human rights organization "Civic Assistance", the cause of death is unknown. The Investigative Committee must conduct an investigation.
Khavazhi Magomadov and his cousin Bislan Magomadov were detained on September 19, 2010 by officers of the Staropromyslovsky District Department of Internal Affairs and were tortured for several days - they were beaten, doused with boiling water, shocked with electric current, Khavazhi was shot in the leg. As a result, the brothers "confessed" to committing 19 episodes of serious crimes, including the murder of Staropromyslovski police officers.

Dagestan. "A pretrial detention center is not a place for torture"?

On July 20, Zagir Yakubov, a native of the Stavropol Territory, committed suicide in Pretrial Detention Center No. 1 in Makhachkala. He was sentenced to 14 years in prison for participating in military operations during the invasion of Dagestan by Shamil Basayev's detachment in 1999.
Two weeks later, Shamil Khadulaev, deputy chairman of the Public Monitoring Commission of Dagestan, reported Yakubov's death on his Telegram channel: "Z. Yakubov, sentenced to 14 years, hanged himself with a bag belt. Two days later, on Saturday, he was supposed to be sent to prison. The prosecutor's office conducted an investigation. The suicide was recorded by video cameras." Commentators on social media expressed bewilderment at how the pretrial detention center staff allowed a bag with a belt to be brought into the cell when they usually take away even shoelaces. Then a woman came into the comments, calling herself Yakubov's widow. "Why don't you write about cuts, hematomas, abrasions? How did he hang himself if both his hands were cut to the tendons?" the woman asked.

"A pretrial detention center is not a place for torture. As a rule, when detainees receive long sentences, they start to get nervous and harm themselves. Sometimes, even right in court," the activist answered the widow and promised to go to the pretrial detention center and find out the details of the tragedy. Later, he said that the only thing the prisoner complained about was that he was forced to shave his beard, and he deleted the comments that mentioned torture. Zagir Yakubov and his fellow countryman Rasul Mailubayev were convicted by the Supreme Court of Dagestan in January of this year. The court found them guilty of being part of the Nogai Jamaat group and taking an active part in its attacks, including an attack on military personnel in the Botlikh District of Dagestan in 1999, when 33 Russian soldiers were killed. Although the statute of limitations for the articles on participation in illegal armed groups and mutiny had already passed, Yakubov and Mailubaev were sentenced under the grave Article 317 - "attempt on the life of military personnel."
A month later, on August 20, the Makhachkala pretrial detention center again came to the attention of human rights activists: the mother of the brothers Mukhtar and Magomedrasul Bagomedov, arrested on charges of making explosives, said that her sons were being tortured there, forcing them to incriminate themselves.
The Bagomedov brothers were detained in June by employees of the Dagestani Center for Combating Extremism. For several days, the family did not know where they were taken. Then, according to their mother Gulnara Bagomedova, the eldest son got in touch and said that he and his brother had been tortured. "He said that he would not sign a confession to something he did not do. And the younger one, unfortunately, could not stand it and signed," the woman said. The lawyer of the detainees intends to seek a medical examination of her clients.

Mordovia. "I hanged myself, but they managed to get me off the noose"
Not only those convicted of terrorism and attacks on security forces are subjected to inhuman treatment, which could be explained by revenge.

On August 15, lawyer Aza Aliyeva published a letter received from 20-year-old Dagestani Ramazan Gadzhiev, who is serving a 6-year sentence for extortion in the maximum-security penal colony No. 1 in the Republic of Mordovia.
"Write to Penal Colony No. 1, where I am now sitting, that the employees here exceed their official powers, beat me, do not allow me to pray, break me 3-4 times a day, beat me with their hands, feet, and sticks. I have been on a dry hunger strike since August 7, 2023. They do not give me water, do not allow me to go to the toilet, the cell is empty, they do not take me out of the cell. They took everything, only my pants were left. They come, pour a fire extinguisher on me, spray pepper spray, and bleach.
On August 8, 2023, I hanged myself, but they managed to take me off the noose and bring me to my senses. They kept watch until the morning, and in the morning they poured all this stuff on me again and left. This is how they treat prisoners here. This is by order of the deputy head of the IK-1 unit for BIOR, E.V. Netskina. If something happens to me, the IK-1 employees will be held responsible for it,” the letter said.
The lawyer immediately sent complaints to the director of the Federal Penitentiary Service, the prosecutor for supervision of the rights of convicts in the Republic of Mordovia, and the Human Rights Commissioner in Dagestan. Ombudsman Jamal Aliyev asked his Mordovian colleague Valery Levin to visit Gadzhiev in the colony and listen to his arguments. "If facts degrading honor and human dignity are confirmed, an appeal will be sent to the competent investigative bodies to organize a procedural check in accordance with Articles 144-145 of the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation," Aliyev promised on the official Telegram channel of the Commissioner for Human Rights in the Republic of Dagestan. On August 16, Gadzhiev was visited by representatives of the Mordovian ombudsman and the prosecutor's office. "In a personal conversation, Gadzhiev explained that during his sentence in this correctional facility, he has no complaints about the conditions of detention, all rights provided for by criminal-executive legislation are observed in relation to him. "He did not confirm the actions of the prison staff noted in the appeal (they poisoned him with bleach, doused him with a fire extinguisher, sprayed him with pepper spray in the cell, there was no toilet or water in the cell, he was not allowed to sleep, he was not taken to the bathhouse, his hygiene items were confiscated, there was no opportunity to pray, as a result of which he tried to hang himself), without explaining the reason for refuting the facts stated in the complaint," the response from an employee of the Office of the Human Rights Commissioner in Mordovia says.
"I would like to contact the Federal Penitentiary Service," lawyer Aza Aliyeva wrote on her Telegram channel. "You should be engaged in observing the rights of convicts instead of following me, screen-screening my posts on Instagram, writing complaints about me to the Bar Association. Engage in ensuring that convicts no longer have the desire to hang themselves within your walls!" Aliyeva was referring to complaints from the Federal Penitentiary Service to the Saratov Bar Association – they demanded that she be excluded from the legal community, attaching scans from social networks where she talked about violations in the colonies that she constantly encounters while defending the interests of her clients. As a result of this pressure, the woman transferred to work in Moscow.