27 February 2025
In the wake of Parliament’s approval of a law on “humanization of pre-trial measures,” it is now proposed that some pretrial detention centres be transferred into the jurisdiction of the FSB.
By Leonid Nikitinsky
Source: Novaya gazeta
The State Duma adopted – and the Federation Council subsequently approved – a law “on the humanization of pre-trial measures” (so described in the upper house’s Telegram channel), although as to what “humanization” will entail is far from confidence-inspiring.
The essence of the changes is that for suspects and those accused of minor to fairly severe non-violent crimes, for which the Criminal Code stipulates up to five years’ imprisonment, pre-trial detention should be applied only in cases in which the perpetrator tried to escape or violated a non-custodial pre-trial measure. Meanwhile, detention, except in exceptional cases, should not be applied to minors, pregnant women, women with small children, a single parent, as well as persons suffering from confirmed ‘serious’ (not explained) diseases.
In practice, defendants, for whom a non-custodial pre-trial measure is chosen, are usually sentenced by courts to punishments also not involving imprisonment. Once it is signed by the president, the new law will not be retroactive, but it may provide a lifeline to those defendants due to have their pre-trial detention term extended.
Of the “popular” criminal code articles, “humanization” will affect Article 228 (acquisition, storage, and transportation of drugs), but will apply only to Part 1, which provides for a punishment of up to three years’ imprisonment for possession of small quantities of narcotics. The new law will also affect non-serious and non-violent property crimes, with an exception provided for Articles 280.3 (public discrediting of the armed forces) and Part 1 of Article 207.3 (concerning “fake news” relating to the army). However, this is rather unnecessary, since, in practice, Part 2 of Article 207.3 is usually applied immediately, and entails a maximum sentence of over five years and is considered “serious”.
Interestingly, this draft bill was introduced by the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation back in June 2023, undersigned by its late chairman Vyacheslav Lebedev.
Why did the Duma suddenly remember about that now? It may have something to do with the draft amnesty that the CPRF recently submitted for consideration – bypassing the United Russia fraction leaders. Consequently, the Communists can now be told the ‘humanization’ has been done, so what more do they want?
The future law will preclude some categories of prisoners being sent as “volunteers” to the SMO [special military operation], including those who up to now have been offered this option as an alternative to pre-trial detention. Perhaps the so-called legislative authorities are privy to information about an upcoming end to the special military operation that the rest of us are not?
The Supreme Court of the Russian Federation has previously shown initiative in matters relating to limiting pretrial detention – primarily in economic cases- both in the form of legislative proposals and in the form of clarifications by the Supreme Court plenum. Nonetheless, this has not particularly affected the practice of applying the “exceptional” (as it is described in the Criminal Procedure Code) measure of pre-trial restraint. It is clear why: investigative bodies have forgotten how to form an evidence base without the accused admitting guilt, and the shortest way to obtain such an admission is to lock them up.
Without taking into account the real situation in remand prisons and penal colonies, it is impossible to assess what the Russian judicial system in the broad sense of the word (including the preliminary investigation) is like. For one and the same term of imprisonment in a remand prison (and the investigation is usually in no hurry to go anywhere), conditions can vary from bad to unbearable.
Meanwhile, the indefatigable deputy Vasily Piskarev reported in his Telegram channel that a bill has been submitted to the Duma to ‘return’ a number of pre-trial detention centres to the jurisdiction of the FSB and to create such specialised isolation centres in cities that do not yet have them.
The figures Piskarev cites to justify his proposal are interesting: from 2015 to 2024, the number of cases of treason, espionage, terrorism and extremism tripled, and the number of suspects and defendants remanded in custody in such cases quadrupled.
The hearing of these cases in closed court sessions deprives us of the possibility of even guessing what exactly has increased: the number of real spies or only prosecutions for espionage, real extremists or only prosecutions for offences under ‘extremist’ articles of the Criminal Code?
The new Russia inherited the GUIN – the Main Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for the Execution of Punishments – from the USSR. During perestroika, the GUIN system began to treat prisoners more humanely; however, even in the late USSR it was impossible to imagine torture performed by the prison guards themselves. In 1996 the GUIN was transferred under the wing of the civilian and at that time still ‘herbivorous’ Ministry of Justice – this was a requirement of the Council of Europe, which the Russian Federation had joined.
In 2004, by presidential decree, the GUIN’s status was upgraded to the Federal Service for the Execution of Punishments (FSIN), which formally remains within the Ministry of Justice but in practice is an independent monster. And the Ministry of Justice has become more of a ‘law enforcement’ ministry as part of the general trend. Civil society no longer has any significant oversight of what happens in the FSIN system.
A first reaction to Piskarev’s proposal to transfer some of the remand prisons to the FSB is an ironical ‘At last!’ After all, all major cities already have separate remand prisons or parts of remand prisons that are under the control of the FSB – in Moscow it is Lefortovo and the so-called Kremlin Central within Matrosskaya Tishina. FSB operatives, unlike lawyers, already have access to any remand prison at their first request, and also exercise oversight of the management of all FSIN institutions (as well as judges who authorise pre-trial custody) through the system of appointments.
At the same time, the FSB bears no responsibility for what happens in the remand prisons, where suicides and murders, not to mention serious injuries, occur from time to time. Why should the Chekists bother about such things?
Vasily Piskarev is not just a deputy, but chairman of the Duma Committee on Security and Anti-Corruption, and before that he served as first deputy chairman of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation. It is unlikely that with such experience he would come out with his initiative without having previously agreed it with the leadership of the FSB. What, then, is the purpose of this lobbying? Presumably, it may be to take over a part of the financial flows that currently pass through the Federal Penitentiary Service. It is not a very large amount of money, but where there’s grain the chicken will eat it.
Translated by Nathalie Wilson and Simon Cosgrove
