Investigators of the Kemerovo Region Office of the Investigative Committee are actively cooperating with the leadership and psychologists of forensic psychologists of Health and Development of Personality, the Kuzbass Regional Center for Psychological, Medical and Social Aid in order to solve crimes committed against minors or by minors and for unbiased and thorough investigation.
An example of such efficient collaboration is the investigation conducted by the Kemerovo Region Office of the Investigative Committee against 14-year-old resident of the town of Myski charged with a crime under Part 2, items “c” and “j” of Article 105 of the RF Penal Code (rap-related murder of a minor).
According to investigators, on 4 August 2016, a 9-year-old girl was reported missing and on 5 August her body was found near the river. Experts found that the cause of her death was asphyxia caused by strangulation and that the girl was raped before being murdered.
A special team of most experienced investigators, criminalists and police officers was set up to investigate the crime. They worked round the clock and established that the last one who had seen the victim alive was a 14-year-old teenager, whom the girl had met the same day on the river bank. He said that he had accompanied the girl as far as the shop and then they had walked in opposite directions. While one of the investigators was looking into the teenager’s truthfulness others worked on other versions of the crime.
More than 100 individuals were checked on having been involved in the crime. Witnesses and local residents were interviewed. Some ex-cons were also monitored. The investigators got 15 DNA samples to be run through 7 different forensic inquiries, including forensic medical, genomic and others. Their results allowed the investigators to build main versions of the crime which they checked thoroughly and thus established that the teenager had been involved in the murder. It is known that the boy is raised in a single-parent family and has previous police records. Following the request of the investigators a court has ruled to put the teenager in custody pending trial.
As the suspect of the crime was a minor, the director of the forensic psychology service (clinical psychologist) of Health and Development of Personality, the Kuzbass Regional Center for Psychological, Medical and Social Aid was extremely helpful during the initial stage of the probe. She provided the investigator with an algorithm and tactics of handling the suspect and his family. This aid helped the investigator to make a contact with the teenager and carry out necessary investigative operations without causing him anymore psychological traumas.
The service of psychologists participating in legal procedure involving minors was set up on the initiative of Kemerovo Region governor and is now a developing system with branches in the towns of Anzhero-Sudzhensk, Belovo, Guryevsk, Kemerovo, Kiselyovsk, Novokuznetsk, Topki. Practice shows that cooperation of the local investigative office with the psychologists of the center in many cases had invaluable importance for the investigation of cases complicated by both the age of the perpetrations, and their mental pathologies, disorders which put obstacles to normal conversation with the investigator. The assistant Chairman of the Investigative Committee has arrived in Kemerovo Region to coordinate the probe and to study the progress of the investigation has offered to disseminate the positive experience of collaboration between investigators and local authorities.
PDF version 
DOC version
