Appeal to state officials and journalists regarding the brutal beating of a convict at the Stryzhavka Correctional Colony No. 81
As it became known from unverified, but various sources, on 11 February 2011, at approximately 11 o’clock, in Correctional Colony No. 81, located in the village of Stryzhavka, Vinnytsia district, Vinnytsia region, representatives of the institution’s administration brutally beat K. Viktor, a convict from the 3rd unit who suffers from HIV infection.
The aforementioned convict was beaten by Warrant Officer Pichuhin. Moreover, the warrant officer himself provoked this beating; he began to publicly humiliate the convict using obscene language: “scum, faggot, and such like.” The convict responded by saying, “do not allow yourself to use such unnecessary things.” After this, Warrant Officer Pichuhin forcibly took K. to the watchtower, where the convict was brutally, savagely beaten. Other warrant officers were already present, but their surnames are not yet known. But Warrant Officer Pichuhin was the one who most actively tortured the convict. Then, the unconscious and bloodied Viktor was carried out of the watchtower premises and hidden in the colony’s medical unit, where he is now, and there are all grounds to believe that bodily injuries were inflicted upon Kotolupenko by Warrant Officer Pichuhin and other staff members of the penal institution.
In addition, K. requires immediate medical assistance as he is suffering from an HIV infection.
Also, we have become aware that in Colony No. 81, cases of convicts being beaten by representatives of the institution’s administration have become more frequent recently.
The Kharkiv Human Rights Group calls on the Prosecutor’s Office and the State Penitentiary Service to actively react to the facts of human rights violations in Correctional Colony No. 81, to thoroughly check the fact of the beating of convict K. Viktor, and to take adequate state measures of response.
We call on journalists to provide wide publicity to this information.
Coordinator of the Kharkiv Human Rights Group programmes, Andriy Didenko.