In 2008, British lawyer Sergei Magnitzky, after
after allegedly uncovering a web of corruption involving senior officials, while working for London-based Hermitage Capital Management.
[Dominic] Raab [Member of British Parliament and Raab, a former Foreign Office lawyer] said: “Between 2007 and 2008, working for Hermitage Capital, he exposed the biggest tax fraud in Russian history, worth $230m US (£146m).
“His legal team was then subject to varying forms of intimidation and, while other lawyers left Russia in fear of their lives, Magnitsky stayed on to make a stand for the rule of law in Russia and strike a blow against the breathtaking corruption that has taken place there.”
Mr Raab added: “That bravery cost him his life. He was arrested in 2008 on trumped up charges of tax evasion. Iin Putin’s Kafkaesque Russian justice system the very tax investigators that Magnitsky exposed turned up to arrest him.”
‘Stark reminder’
After eight months in prison his condition deteriorated and he was taken [pullquote]Magnitzky died in custody aged 37. His cause was taken up by human rights groups as one of the most glaring examples of corruption and prison abuse in modern Russia. He had suffered from pancreatitis and gallstones, and had been found with broken fingers and bruising to his body, the Kremlin’s Human Rights Council said in July 2011.[/pullquote] to hospital for emergency surgery. But he was not treated, but instead handcuffed and beaten, Mr Raab said. “Doctors found him an hour later lying on the floor. He was dead.” Despite 60 people implicated in the abuse of Mr Magnitsky and the original tax fraud, “the Russian authorities blocked all attempts to bring those responsible to justice”, Mr Raab said. “All the suspects were cleared by Russian investigators. Some have been promoted, some decorated. In fact, the only people on trial are Magnitsky’s employer and Magnitsky himself, now the subject of Russia’s first ever posthumous prosecution.” Mr Raab’s motion also covered other cases “wherever there is evidence that a state official anywhere is responsible for torture, extra judicial killing, some other gross human rights abuse or is complicit in covering it up”. Foreign Office minister Alistair Burt said: “The death of Sergei Magnitsky serves as a stark reminder of the human rights situation in Russia, and questions about the rule of law there.”
MPs urge government sanctions against Russia over Magnitsky death (BBC)
The BBC reports we’ve read so far don’t address Sergei Magnitsky’s citizenship – Russian, British, dual or other. And perhaps his nationality is, or should be irrelevant. At a minimum, as a British attorney, he was an officer of the United Kingdom justice system. He uncovered serious corruption in Russia, he was arrested on what appear to be false allegations, and killed in prison. We think that this evidence, taken together, is overwhelming evidence of at least probable cause of a crime and cover-up.