On January 16, the Southern District Military Court in Rostov-on-Don handed down another sentence to a native of Ingushetia, Ali Taziev, a militant commander known as “Amir Magas.” He was sentenced to life imprisonment in a special regime colony for several serious crimes committed in 2009-2010.
Among the charges against him are organizing a criminal community (Article 210 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), banditry (Article 209), encroachment on the lives of military personnel (Article 317), illegal trafficking in weapons (Article 222), manufacturing explosive devices (Article 223) , intentional damage to property (Article 167).
The trial lasted almost two years and ultimately found Taziev guilty of creating a criminal community together with Doku Umarov in October 2007, which he led until June 2010. Several of his gangster groups operated on the territory of Ingushetia and attempted to kill police officers and military personnel. Thus, the verdict states that Magas organized three armed attacks on traffic police posts in the Nazran region of Ingushetia, the bombing of an armored personnel carrier of the internal troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs on the Caucasus highway and other crimes, the victims of which were not only security forces, but also civilians.
This is the third life sentence for the former leader of the armed underground in Ingushetia, who is serving his sentence in the Black Dolphin special regime colony. He was captured in 2010 in Malgobek as a result of a special operation by the FSB.
His first sentence was handed down in 2013 for, according to the prosecution, bombing a passenger bus, a terrorist attack in the Nazran police department and an attempt on the life of the head of Ingushetia, Yunus-Bek Yevkurov. Two years later, in 2015, the Southern District Court handed down a second life sentence to him for participation in Shamil Basayev’s gang and an attempted terrorist attack “with the aim of changing the territorial integrity of the Russian Federation.”
According to the website of the Southern District Court, Taziev’s lawyer appealed the third verdict.