The publication of Novaya Gazeta about a 25-year-old resident of Udmurtia, Yevgeny Ipatov, caused a great resonance. Before his death, he recorded a video in which he said that the police department in Sochi allegedly tried to force a confession out of him. After the publication of this video, three departments immediately conducted an inspection: the Investigative Committee, the Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for the Kuban and the Sochi prosecutor's office. Two criminal cases have been opened — on abuse of power and incitement to suicide — however, in relation to «unknown persons». Interrogations were carried out, Ipatov's mother was recognized as a victim.
Evgeny Ipatov. Photos from social networks
However, a month later, no charges were brought against anyone and there is still no information about who could be involved in the beating of a young guy in the police department. Although the materials of the pre-investigation check (available to the editors) contain the data of the operative who detained and interrogated Ipatov. There are also the results of a forensic medical examination, which indicate suspicious injuries. One gets the impression that the work so far is not aimed at finding those involved in the crime, but at making Ipatov an ordinary suicide.
… Let us recall the outline of events. On September 4 last year, Ipatov received an order from a certain contractor, Maxim Ryabchenko. He offered to fix problems in the wiring at the customer Anatoly Zhdanov, they agreed to share the payment for the work among themselves. In a conversation with Novaya, pensioner Zhdanov recalled that Ipatov allegedly introduced himself as Ivan, and it seemed to him that on that day the guy seemed «twitchy», he was agitated by something.
During the work between «Ivan» and Maxim had a conflict. The contractor, as Ipatov later said, eventually left. And Zhenya could not finish the work, having agreed with the customer that he would continue tomorrow morning. But the next day, Zhdanov could not get through to «Ivan». And Ipatov, in turn, claimed that he did not get through to the pensioner.
A couple of days later, Zhdanov discovered the loss of 60 thousand rubles in his apartment. For a long time I thought about whether to contact law enforcement officers. As a result, he wrote a statement about the theft of money nine days later, on September 13 (the statement is at the disposal of the editors).
From suspect to witness 
Dmitry Ivannikov
“I declare that the 60 thousand that they hung on me, these testimonies were beaten out of me,” the video recording begins with these words, made shortly before Ipatov’s body was found on the railway tracks. This video was given to us by his friend, 45-year-old Dmitry Ivannikov. In the editorial office of Novaya, he spoke in detail about the latest events that happened to his comrade.
Ipatov's video message says that on September 22 he went to the next order at the address: st. Makarenko, 1 — to fix broken sockets.
There he was detained by two policemen and demanded to confess to stealing 60 thousand rubles from pensioner Zhdanov. On the way to the department, the operatives allegedly beat the detainee,
one of the policemen allegedly introduced himself as Ruslan, Yevgeny spoke to the camera.
“We arrived at the police department on Makarenko Street, near the Magnit store. They pulled me very hard out of the car by my T-shirt, dragged me down the corridor, took me to the office and threw me on the floor. Then they started beating me, I covered my face, they beat me on the palm, on the ribs, kidneys, leg <…>. They wanted to pin the case on me… I declare once again that I did not take any 60,000. I have never stolen in my life and never will. It will all be on their conscience. Mom, dad, I love you. Say hello to everyone, ”the video ends with these words.
On the day of his arrest, September 22, Ipatov wrote a confession and confessed to the theft. The case was opened a day later under paragraph «a» part 3 of Art. 158 of the Criminal Code (theft committed with illegal entry into a dwelling). It follows from the materials of the investigation that on the day of the arrest, the detective of the Sochi Internal Affairs Directorate, junior police lieutenant R.A. Tazayan questioned Ipatov.
“I carried out electrical work, drew attention to the ajar wardrobe located in the hallway, where I saw money between things and, waiting for the owners of the apartment to go into another room, stole the money. <…> Then I told the owner of the apartment that I would finish the work the next day <…>, then I blocked the subscriber number belonging to Anatoly and did not get in touch with him anymore, I spent the stolen amount of 60,000 rubles for my own needs, ”- allegedly informed the operative under protocol Ipatov.
On September 23, strange metamorphoses begin to occur with the case. Eugene changes his testimony, and he is transferred to the status of a witness. During interrogation by the senior investigator for especially important cases from the police department of the Central District of the Directorate of the Internal Affairs Directorate for the city of Sochi, the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia A.A. Burnacheeva Ipatov categorically denied the theft.
“Going into the apartment, we [with Maxim as an intermediary] were met by grandparents, the owners of the apartment. I looked at the junction boxes where everything was broken. I got to work, Maxim constantly followed me and asked me to teach him. To which I sharply replied that I was not going to teach him and that he was in the way, he asked me to leave the apartment, ”the interrogation record was recorded according to Ipatov.
In his video message, he explained that he was forced to sign a confession, and also drew up a protocol of disobedience to the police. However, a day later, Ipatov was released without any signatures. Moreover, according to Zhenya, the investigator drove him home, went into the room, photographed everything and allegedly said that he needed money in order to rewrite the banknote numbers for some reason. “I had 26,000 rubles in my stash then. He took the money, we got into the car with him, drove me a couple of meters from the house, said that he was interested in red bills. Took 23 thousand. Oman (this is how the investigator introduced himself) said: look, you signed the witness list, now you have nothing to be afraid of, come out and go calmly, ”Ipatov told the camera.
The next day, the operatives and the investigator continued to pester Yevgeny, they demanded that he come to them again. It is not surprising that they did not lag behind Ipatov, since on September 24, operative Tazayan interrogated the same contractor Maxim Ryabchenko (in July 2019 he was convicted of purchasing, possessing drugs and driving while intoxicated. The Khostinsky District Court of Sochi sentenced him to imprisonment freedom for 1 year 3 months in a colony-settlement — Ed.). He said that when he came to order, he could not do the job without special equipment. Ryabchenko contacted Ipatov via the Internet and called him for help (in the survey materials, Ryabchenko for some reason calls Yevgeny Pavel. — Ed.).
“I would like to add that in the apartment I was in direct visibility with the owner of the house. I learned about the theft of money from the police, I suspect that Pavel could have stolen the money, since he promised to come the next day and complete the repairs, but did not come and did not answer the calls of the owner of the apartment, ”Ryabchenko explained to the operative.
Sochi police still haven't found the thief. According to the victim Zhdanov, the investigation is ongoing.
“I went into the room and got scared”
Ipatov could not stand the pressure that the security forces put on him, and decided, together with his friend Dmitry Ivannikov, to rent an apartment in Adler.
They agreed that they would split up: Zhenya would go to Moscow and tell journalists about his story, while Ivannikov himself, according to him, would wait for a friend in Krasnaya Polyana.
Ipatov did not reach Moscow. Instead, he rented a room in a guest house in the Adler district. According to the explanations given to the police by the mistress of the house, on September 24, a young man who called himself Ivan rented a room from her. “All these days he was in the room, none of the strangers entered the room. The room was quiet and peaceful.”
Ipatov paid for accommodation until the 30th. But after September 28, the hostess did not see the tenant again. The next day, she learned that the body of a young guy had been found on the railway tracks. I did not dare to go into Ipatov's room, because the room was paid for. In the afternoon of the next day, she nevertheless opened the room and was frightened: the mirrors were hung with towels, blood stains on the bed and on the curtain in the bathroom. The hostess immediately turned to the LOP (linear police department) and there she found out that the guy's name was Eugene. During the inspection of the room, the police found a clerical knife blade with traces of blood in the bathroom.
Ipatov's body was found under a train on September 29 at the Khosta-Adler stage. According to the explanations of the locomotive crew, the driver applied emergency braking, but could not prevent the collision, and the guy ran to the tracks himself.
General view of the scene. Photo: from the materials of the investigation in the Ipatov case
Strange damage
Relatives of Zhenya's death became aware only on October 20 from the volunteers of the LizaAlert organization, who are looking for missing people. None of the policemen bothered to report the tragedy. In the morgue, Yevgeny’s relatives were also not particularly ceremonious: they gave a death certificate, and all other questions were given to the investigator. Yevgeny's mother Lyudmila Zyankina was able to get acquainted with the results of the forensic medical examination only when the case had already been made public. So far, no one has contacted her.
As a result of the autopsy, the expert divided the injuries found on the corpse into two groups:
а)
- complete amputation of the head;
- multifragmentary comminuted fracture of the bones of the vault and base of the skull;
- hemorrhage in the soft tissues of the temporal and occipital regions;
- fracture of the left clavicle;
- abrasion in the area of the left shoulder girdle;
- abrasion on the outer surface of the right shoulder;
b)
- wound in the right inguinal region;
- a wound in the left inguinal region with a wound channel extending from it, along which the soft tissues of the thigh were damaged;
- a wound on the anterior surface of the left forearm.
The injuries listed in group “a” (except for abrasions and a fracture of the collarbone) are injuries that caused serious bodily harm, and they cumulatively led, according to the conclusions of the examination, to death from a train collision. And injuries from group «b»— causing minor damage. Against the background of the injuries received from the train collision, these wounds, according to Ipatov's mother, look very suspicious. The expert noted that injuries in the form of a wound in the left inguinal region were caused by a sharp object with piercing and cutting properties, and the remaining wounds were caused by a sharp object with cutting properties.
At a forensic chemical examination, the presence of ethyl alcohol and narcotic No substances were found in Ipatov's blood and urine.
In the materials of the check, Ipatov's relatives also noticed that they added the explanations of Lyudmila Zyankina and Vasily Ipatov's uncle. Investigator of the Adler LOP Junior Lieutenant L.R. Vlasova indicated in the protocol that the survey was conducted on October 1. The mother is outraged by this. Indeed, how could she be in Sochi on the 1st, if she found out about the death of her son at the end of October, with Vasily they reached Sochi only on the 24th, and Yevgeny’s body was handed over on the 26th?
“Violated railway crossing rules”
Based on the available materials, on October 29, the investigator of the Krasnodar Investigation Department for Transport, Belyusenko, refused to initiate a criminal case due to the absence of a crime event. He concluded that Ipatov had committed «a violation of the rules for crossing the railroad tracks.»
But after the publication of Ipatov's video on the Novaya website, the Investigative Committee canceled the decision to refuse to initiate proceedings and sent the materials for additional verification.
Further events began to develop rapidly. Literally the next day, Yevgeny's mother, his uncle Vasily and Anastasia B. were summoned for interrogation, to whom Ipatov was the first to hand over the dying video. She then sent the video to her ex-husband and friend Zhenya Dmitry Ivannikov.
However, after he told our editorial staff about the incident, he disappeared. It turned out that in December 2021 he left Moscow, explaining that he had no money and a roof over his head. We offered Dmitry help to temporarily place him in a social shelter and restore his documents, he categorically refused. And after the release of the publication, he completely stopped answering calls.
It is not known if the investigators discovered Ivannikov's whereabouts and interrogated him.