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In Saint Petersburg, former school director and his accomplices charged with crimes against sexual integrity of children’s home residents to stand trial

The Main Investigations Directorate of the Investigative Committee of Russia concluded the investigation into Stanislav Vinogradov, former director of the School No. 565 of Kirovsky district of Saint Petersburg; Mikhail Yelin, former deputy director of a children’s home; Pavel Prikashchikov, Kirill Pokalyuk and Andrey Solovyov, former residents of the children’s home and students of the school. Depending on the involvement of each, they are charged with offences under Article 132 of the Criminal Code of Russia (sexual assault).

During the investigation, the Investigative Committee of Russia discovered 23 episodes of the defendants’ sexual assault against foster children of the Family Upbringing Assistance Centre No. 8 for orphans and children left without parental care since 2002 to 2017.

The investigation gathered enough evidence; therefore, the criminal case with the approved indictment was sent to the court to be tried on the merits.

In addition, the court is hearing an investigation into Valentin Mikhailov, former mentor of the children’s home; Vyacheslav Prikashchikov, relative to one of the defendants; and Mikhail Nikitin, former resident of the children’s home. According to the investigation, after law enforcement had found out about the facts of the sexual assault against the children, the defendants forced the victims to commit perjury and refuse from testifying, while blackmailing them and threatening with murder (Part 2 of Article 309 of the Criminal Code of Russia).

Photographer Alexander Brykov was prosecuted as well. He is charged with offences under Part 1 of Article 242.1, and Paragraph E of Part 2 of Article 132 of the Criminal Code of Russia (illegal production and distribution of pornographic materials; sexual assault). The investigation believes that, in 2005-2008, Brykov had been taking minor residents of the children’s home to his apartment, filming pornographic materials, and sexually assaulting the children. His case has already been sent to the court.

Moreover, the investigation provided a legal assessment of actions of Natalia Fedorova, former director of the children’s home, charged with an offence under Part 1 of Article 293 of the Criminal Code of Russia (neglect of duty). She is accused of failing to respond to reports on criminally offensive acts against residents of the children’s home. The investigation is at the final stage.

A massive amount of work was carried out during the preliminary investigation in order to establish all the facts of the criminal offences against the minors. The expert approach of the investigators provided for identifying of all the perpetrators and giving them a legal assessment.

The Investigative Committee of Russia has a principal attitude to investigating of crimes against socially vulnerable groups of citizens. The investigators do their utmost to have each such fact investigated thoroughly and to bring to justice everyone who maliciously violated the rights of such vulnerable group of the community as children, especially residents of children’s homes.