The State Duma is recommended to adopt a bill on the release of seriously ill prisoners

The State Duma Committee on State Construction and Legislation recommended that parliament adopt in the first reading a bill on the immediate release of seriously ill convicts. The law now requires that they be kept in custody for at least another 15 days after the court’s decision to give the prosecutor the opportunity to appeal their release. The relevant committee told Kommersant that this situation “does not fully meet constitutional principles,” and the amendments will “increase guarantees for the protection of the life and health of citizens.” Previously, human rights activists and lawyers supported the initiative, but insisted on the need to go further – to simplify the procedure for the decision on release.

Yesterday, February 19, the Duma Committee on State Construction and Legislation announced its recommendation to adopt a bill that would humanize the procedure for the release of seriously ill prisoners. The corresponding conclusion states that amendments to the Criminal Procedure Code will make it possible to “increase the level of state guarantees for the protection of life and health of citizens serving sentences, and to prevent excessively prolonged restrictions on their rights and freedoms when applying criminal punishment in the event of a serious illness of the convicted person.” In this regard, it is recommended to adopt the bill in the first reading.

As Kommersant previously reported, draft amendments to the Code of Criminal Procedure were submitted to the State Duma in December last year by the Supreme Court of Russia. The Supreme Court proposed to consolidate the rule on the immediate execution of a court decision on the release of a seriously ill convict. Today, from the moment the court decides to release a person due to illness until the actual release, at least 15 days pass – this is the period allocated for an appeal. And if the prosecutor’s office appeals the court’s decision, the release of a seriously ill person could be delayed for months.

Human rights activists and the legal community welcomed the initiative of the Supreme Court. However, experts interviewed by Kommersant noted that the bill does not solve the main problem – the difficulty of obtaining the decision on release itself. Thus, a member of the Moscow Public Monitoring Committee, lawyer of the Prisoner Assistance Fund, Alexander Maltsev, told Kommersant that problems begin at the stage of examining seriously ill prisoners: “Such an examination is carried out only upon the recommendation of the head of the institution. And then the process can last for years.” Moreover, he notes, many doctors are afraid to give opinions on the presence of serious illnesses in prisoners, since they themselves risk being put on trial. In December last year, for example, the head doctor of the Matrosskaya Tishina pre-trial detention center hospital, Alexander Kravchenko, was sentenced to seven years in prison. According to investigators, he illegally released several convicts and arrestees and transferred one to hospital status. The doctor did not admit guilt and stated that he was fulfilling his duty, saving the lives of seriously ill patients. At the same time, the court often refuses to satisfy requests for release, Mr. Maltsev added. Let us recall that earlier experts from Sitting Rus’ (included by the Ministry of Justice in the register of foreign agents) told Kommersant that the courts “satisfy less than half of the requests for release due to illness.” And according to the Federal Penitentiary Service for 2020, about 23% of those who requested release due to serious illness eventually died before their release (such statistics were not published subsequently).

First Deputy Chairman of the Committee on State Construction and Legislation Irina Pankina, commenting on the committee’s position to Kommersant, said that exemption from punishment due to illness is often used in judicial practice – according to statistics, every year Russian courts make about 2 thousand decisions on release due to illness. state of health. “However, in view of the possibility of appealing such a decision provided for by law and the general rules of the criminal procedure law regarding the timing of the entry into force of court decisions, in practice it turns out that a seriously ill person continues to serve his sentence, including in places of deprivation of liberty, despite the already issued decision on his release , which, of course, does not fully meet constitutional principles,” she emphasized. “In this regard, the proposed provision, according to which a court decision to release a convicted person from serving a sentence due to illness will be carried out immediately, seems relevant and justified and will increase guarantees for the protection of life and health of citizens serving sentences.” At the same time, Ms. Pankina did not comment on the arguments of lawyers and human rights activists that the initiative will not completely eradicate the problem with the release of seriously ill prisoners, noting that this issue relates to law enforcement.

“The situation can be corrected by the political will of the director of the Federal Penitentiary Service, who will say that employees of medical units and heads of pre-trial detention centers can not be afraid, but can safely send a person to a commission for the presence of a disease, if there are grounds for this,” a member of the Presidential Council for Human Rights told Kommersant. Eva Merkacheva. The human rights activist added that it is also necessary to simplify the release procedure as much as possible in the government resolutions “On medical examination of suspects and the list of serious diseases that prevent detention” and “On medical examination of convicts proposed for release from serving a sentence due to illness”: “There should be it is clearly stated that a person who has a serious diagnosis has the right to be included in the commission, bypassing the decision of the head of the pre-trial detention center and medical units, simply based on the very presence of a serious illness.”

It is expected that parliament will begin considering the bill during the spring session.

Emilia Gabdullina