"Memorial" employee claims witness resorted to violence during search

During the search in the office of the science and information center "Memorial" in St-Petersburg, one of the attesting witnesses delivered a blow on Elena Alexandrova, volunteer of the organization. This has been reported to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent by Tatiana Morgacheva, the center employee, who witnessed the incident.

"When they were reading out the search report, Alexandrova was writing down the names of the prosecutor's office officers and other participants. At this moment one of the attesting witnesses roughly grabbed her by her hands and tried to take the paper from her. He shouted: "Why are you writing down my name!". The investigating officer and his colleagues seemed not to notice this", relayed Morgacheva.

According to Tatiana Morgacheva, the attesting witnesses came to "Memorial" together with the group of officers who conducted the search.

It is known from the order which is at the disposal of the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent, that the search was conducted by the investigating officers from the Central district unit of the Investigating Committee under the St-Petersburg prosecutor's office within the criminal case under RF CC, Article 282, 1, (instigation of national enmity). The case was initiated against А. Andreyev after the publication of the article "Here is the true candidate!" by K. Cherniayev in the "Novyi Peterburg" newspaper on June 21, 2007.

"As of today, the location of the documents indicating from which sources and by whom the newspaper has been financed is not known <...>",  runs the search order signed by senior investigator М. G. Kalaganov.

According to the investigation information, "the above documents... may be kept in one of the rooms of the "St-Petersburg charity organization "Memorial" which is located at the address St-Petersburg, 23 Rubinshtein Street, flay No 103".

Note, that there are two organizations named "Memorial" in St-Petersburg. There is St-Petersburg charity historical and educational human rights organization "Memorial" located in Raziezhaya Street. Thus, the investigator has either confused the name of the organization or the search venue.

"We are now writing complaints to the prosecutor's office, the chief of the Investigating department of the Investigating Committee, chairperson of the Committee on the issues of legality, order and security of the St-Petersburg Legislative Assembly, and the RF Ombudsman, - to everyone", relayed Tatiana Morgacheva to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

In her turn, Irina Flige, director of the SIC "Memorial", stated that she would go to court and demand compensation of moral damage, as well as the damage which, in her view, was inflicted on the human rights organization: "There is no and has never been any connection between "Memorial" and the newspaper "Novyi Peterburg". Moreover, some of the names we were given had not been known to us until yesterday".