The father of a 12-year-old racer killed in a motocross race seeks punishment: “The lungs were torn”

Today, the world celebrates Deadly Motorcyclist Day. Usually, when racers get into an accident, they say that it is their own fault – they didn’t cope, they broke the rules, they were reckless on the roads.

However, the death of 12-year-old cross racer Grisha Lozinsky in August 2020 shocked the entire motorcycle world.

The boy crashed on August 15 at a competition in provincial Shuya, where there was not even an ambulance on duty. “The organizers, I believe, violated all the rules and laws that there may be. And when it came to criminal proceedings, they said that this was not an official motocross at all, but simply an open training, although they even sold licenses for this event, one of which we bought, flags were hanging, judges were present. We would never have showed up there if it had been an ordinary training session,” says the father of the deceased teenager, Alexei Lozinsky, three years later.

Incompatible with life

At the trial, it was considered that the lack of an ambulance did not play any role: the young athlete, in their opinion, would not have been saved in any case. He received injuries incompatible with life. This means that there is no one to punish for his death. No one was embarrassed by the fact that the races were held in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic and, therefore, could not be officially agreed upon with anyone.

“On this day, three competitions were held in three regions – near Belgorod, in Obninsk, in Shuya. We chose Shuya because it was said that the competition is held under the auspices of the National Motorcycle Federation of Russia, that is, not a local race, but a high professional level,” says Father Alexey Lozinsky.

Witnesses recall that everything was for real: protocols, regulations, posters, judges – everything indicated that a serious sporting event was coming. Literally a week after Shuya, the first stage of the Moscow region championship was supposed to take place, Grigory Lozinsky was part of the national team, he was considered a promising racer on a Russian scale. So Grisha was not faced with the task of winning in Shuya. There was still more to come.

“The race track was all licked and sprinkled with sand, from a distance it looked ideal, fast, like abroad. My son also noted that it was as if we were in the Baltic states. It turned out later that in fact the track stood idle for a long time, no one drove on it, it was broken and had holes – they just sprinkled sand on top for beauty,” says Alexey.

Already during the judicial investigation, it became clear that the workers who prepared it did not have the proper experience in preparing this type of coating and, since there was a sand quarry nearby, they simply decided to hide all the irregularities and fossils.

The guys passed the first stage, the second, the fourth… Grigory Lozinsky was in class 85 – motorcycles with an 85 cm3 internal combustion engine.

“His lungs were ruptured.”

The father was calm. He himself is a former athlete and current coach, trained athletes “for results” and was confident in his son.

“Grisha and I had our own methodology. The first lap he just drives and watches, the second he increases the speed, the rest he works at full speed. This way we “read” the route.”

Alexey says that he was waiting for Grisha at the finishing ramp. He saw that some racer had turned over, but did not realize that it was his son. “The motorcycle did a somersault and fell. It dawned on me that it was Grisha when the guys he had overtaken were passing by… I ran up to him, he was lying and not breathing – the motorcycle was to the side, I took off the helmet and began to give him artificial respiration. His lungs were torn…”

About two minutes later the paramedic came up. He immediately declared death. It only became clear that the ambulance was not on duty at the scene. “I didn’t want to believe that my son died and continued to pump him… and literally a few minutes later Grisha began to breathe… Immediately they started calling 112, the intensive care unit was passing by from the call, Grisha

we were taken to Ivanovo, because Shuya is too small a town and there was no suitable hospital and specialists there, in Ivanovo Grisha lay in a coma for seven days, and I was with him for all seven days… All the surgeons and neurosurgeons from the leading medical centers to which I appealed, they expressed the opinion that due to the fact that there were no doctors at the start, golden time was lost when it was still possible to try to save him.”

Farewell to Grisha Lozinsky took place on August 26, 2020, at 11:00 in the city of Vidnoye. Literally everyone has heard about this tragedy in the motorcycle world. Even I, far from these high-speed passions, read on my social network feed: “Grisha, live!” And a photo of a cute guy in a cool motorcycle helmet.

Yes, it happens that racers crash to death, the track does not forgive mistakes, and this sport sometimes involves high risk, alas. But when clearly insufficient preparation is added to this, the high risk becomes fatal.

“An uneven track, incomprehensible competitions, which, as the organizers immediately began to prove, were not competitions at all, lack of medical care,” the boy’s father lists the reasons that, in his opinion, led to a fatal outcome. He says that he sent investigators the purchased participation license to prove that it was not a training session – but for some reason the trial court did not pay due attention to it.

Yes, the Investigative Committee of the Ivanovo Region opened a criminal case regarding the provision of services that do not meet the requirements for the safety of life or health of consumers, which through negligence resulted in the infliction of serious harm to health or the death of a person. The investigation was conducted against the organizer of the motocross competition, a 58-year-old resident of Shuya. The defendant was accused of poorly preparing the track, which resulted in the fatal fall of the minor participant.

“We lost the court of first instance in Shuya, the appeal in Ivanovo, the cassation in Moscow,” says the father. “For some reason, the court in Shuya did not find out about the violations that led to the tragedy, but focused only on the fact that Grisha’s death in any case did not depend on the lack of an ambulance for the competition.”

The verdict was read at the end of 2022. The cassation in Moscow took place on August 22, 2023 – exactly on the third anniversary of the boy’s death. His friends and relatives thought this was a good sign, but the defendant was acquitted.

Based on the evidence presented, witness testimony, and expert opinions, the court found him innocent of the act accused of him due to the lack of corpus delicti in his act, recognizing his right to rehabilitation.

“The verdict stated that since eight witnesses believe that the route was well prepared, and four, which is disgusting, the majority is right. Three forensic medical examinations were carried out, but none really answered the question of why help was not provided on time, did this influence the fact that Grisha died? Although what can we talk about – if everything had gone as it should, the accident might not have happened at all!” – the father cannot come to his senses. He says he will continue to fight to ensure that those responsible for the death of the minor athlete are held accountable.

Grisha Lozinsky would have turned 16 this fall. On his monument in the cemetery, he himself is frozen in a jump on his motorcycle. After the death of the teenager, competitions were no longer held on that fateful Shuya track.

Igor KomissarovVice-President of the Russian Motorcycle Federation, Major General of Justice:

– As for the criminal case regarding the provision of services of inadequate quality, which resulted in the death of a person, I can say that the investigation did everything it could in this situation and collected a sufficient amount of evidence, sending the case to court. I cannot say why the court made such a decision and announced an acquittal.

This sport is very expensive. And it is clear that the organizers of such competitions want to make money from organizing them, sometimes forgetting that the main thing is not making a profit, but the life and health of the participants.

Alexander Jeushead of the Russian Motorcycle Federation:

– It’s a strange day today – the Day of Remembrance of Dead Motorcyclists. Someone invented it, and I think on this day it is worth remembering the names of those who are not.

One of them is Grigory Lozinsky. Obviously, the death of this athlete was associated with a specific violation of the competition rules, which were not in the Federation calendar. We gave our conclusion to the investigation on this matter.

Real competitions take a long time to prepare and are coordinated with a huge number of authorities, including the police and ambulance. Participants must understand this and not take part in such events, and especially not allow children to participate in unaccredited tracks. Unfortunately, many competitions in our country are still held in a “Makhnovist” manner. We must fight this mercilessly – it shouldn’t be like this.