Law enforcement officers have completed the investigation into the case of a torture chamber that operated in the Kupyansk district police department during the occupation of part of the territory of the Kharkiv region from March to September 2022, the Prosecutor General’s Office (PGO) has said.
“As part of the investigation, 18 people involved in the detention and abuse of civilians were identified. Among them: the so-called “chief” of the “Internal Affairs Department of the Provisional Civil Administration of the Kharkiv Region” illegally formed by the occupation forces, Russian military personnel, members of the illegal armed formations “Luhansk/Donetsk Peoples’ Republics”, as well as former Ukrainian police officers,” the message on Telegram states.
After the liberation of the city by the Defense Forces, law enforcement officers conducted extensive work and identified more than 90 victims – these are teachers, rescuers, participants in hostilities, representatives of state authorities, volunteers, entrepreneurs and other civilian residents. During interrogations, the victims told prosecutors and police investigators about the abuse they were subjected to during their detention.
“There was constant screaming throughout the station. You could hear others being beaten – and it went on for days,” recalls a 57-year-old participant in pro-Ukraine rallies.
During the pre-trial investigation, numerous facts of cruel treatment of the population were documented. Civilians were held in inhumane conditions: there were 15 people in cells designed for two or three people. Due to critical overcrowding, the detainees were suffocated, without water and basic medical care.
They were fed mainly with leftover food left over from the Russian military. Some victims lost up to 20 kilograms of weight during their detention.
People were beaten with hands, feet, sticks, and electric shocks:
“After the electric shock, they had surgery on their hands… But I still don’t have full feeling. My hands still don’t go away completely,” said one of the victims.
During the torture, the victims were forced to give false testimony about themselves and their acquaintances, to confess to collaborating with the Armed Forces of Ukraine and the State Security Service of Ukraine (SBU). If they refused, they were threatened with murder, torture of loved ones, or detention of relatives.
In some cases, the abuse took the form of psychological terror – they simulated executions or forced people to dig graves for themselves and others. One of the men was tied with plastic ties above his head to a metal grate in the middle of the yard – he hung for hours, unable to even sit down.
“They were driven along the corridor in handcuffs at a walking pace – just to abuse him,” said one of the victims, a 45-year-old businessman.
“They broke me morally: they put handcuffs on me for no reason, they broke my hands, even though I was the one who started them because my hand hurt,” a former forestry worker testified.
Almost every day, all prisoners were forced to sing the Russian anthem.
In September 2022, during the offensive of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the occupiers began to flee and left the cells with the prisoners locked. The victims, left to their own devices, broke the bars on their own, found their documents in the offices, and finally went free.
Some of the victims never lived to see freedom after the torture they endured. They are still being held captive in the occupied territories. The materials on this fact have been separated into a separate case, and the investigation is ongoing.
The prosecutor of the Kharkiv Regional Prosecutor’s Office approved an indictment against all 18 involved for violating the laws and customs of war, committed by a group of persons in a preliminary conspiracy (Part 2 of Article 28, Part 1 of Article 438 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine).
Two of them were additionally charged with collaboration activities (Part 7 of Article 111-1 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine).
Two of the accused will appear in court in person. The rest are wanted and will be tried in absentia.
