But the comprehensive, first-hand evidence delivered by Savelyev was groundbreaking, said Vladimir Osechkin, the head of, the prisoners’ rights group that began publishing the videos last month. “This kind of leak of secret information … has never taken place in the history of modern Russia or the post-Soviet space,” said Osechkin in remarks from France, where he has been reviewing the data along with Savelyev and other activists. Osechkin said that a new documentary film would identify more individuals directly responsible for torture and abuse at the Saratov prison hospital.
Afterwards, Osechkin said, they plan to focus on top officials from the prison and security services whom he believes were involved in a thriving trade of blackmail and the order of abuse of inmates for money. The recordings of abuse, which Savelyev said were premeditated and then handed off to prison officials or deleted, showed that “these instances of torture, including rape, were committed by order and weren’t just individual decisions”, said Osechkin. Osechkin has written a public letter to Vladimir Putin calling for an end to the “pipeline of torture”.
The leak of premeditated recordings has prompted a reluctant investigation in Russia.
