‘They Walked Him Barefoot On Snow, Put on ‘Stretcher’
- 28.05.2019, 16:46
The wife of the prisoner who died behind bars in Valadarka prison spoke about the tortures implied against her husband.
Three days ago Alena Tsiareshchanka from Ratamka buried her husband, who died in the prison hospital of the Minsk detention facility located in the Valadarski Street, Radio Svaboda reports.
Andrei Tsiareshchanka fell into a coma seven times while behind the bars, and the staff of the Zhodzina prison #8 believed that he was driving himself into this state in order to get home over health reasons.
He served 3 months out of 18
In February 2019, Andrei Tsiareshchanka was convicted by the Minsk District Court for 1.5 years of imprisonment for repeated drunk driving. He managed to serve only 3 months of this sentence. However, Alena Tsiareshchanka thinks that he should not have been in the Zhodzin prison even for such period, as he got there in an extremely serious health condition.
The woman is going to complain about the administration of the correctional institution. It’s impossible that the prison administration in Zhodzina failed to notice how sick the new prisoner was.
“In addition to diabetes in a severe stage, he had a suspicion of cancer, the pancreatic cancer. He simply did not have time to make such a diagnosis, but according to all analyzes it should have been it. He took the medical certificates with him when he went to the court; they should be in his case. In prison, they knew exactly how sick my husband was. I do not rule out that he would die soon even if he was free, but they did nothing to let him go die at home. I can't forgive this,” says the woman.
Alena also complained that not a single document confirming her husband’s health condition was returned to her, only personal belongings.
They walked him barefoot in the snow
Another reason she cites is information about how her husband was treated in prison.
“On a meeting, he himself said that he had fallen into repeated comas, but nobody believed him, they say that he deliberately provoked them. They punished my husband to prevent him from doing so. He said that they walked him barefoot in the snow, and also put on a “stretch”.
At the same time, Alena recalls that the guard, who was present during the conversation, did not believe her husband and began to refute him.
“But my husband was telling the truth. He didn’t know a word like “stretch” before, but he described everything exactly how it was done,” she says.
According to her version, with such tortures, they tried to make her husband stop “driving himself into a coma”.
You do not know how to smile to a client
Andrei Tsiarreshchanka was 45 years old, he earned for living by selling spare parts in the auto marjet in Zhdanovichy for over 10 years. However, the economic crisis has affected this once successful industry.
“He used to have three trade points in the car market, but 2-3 years ago things went wrong,” says Alena. “ They have insanely increased the rent there, and revenues have fallen, the demand has declined. He closed the business, for some time he worked for another businessman, then he ended up being a “parasite”. He was very worried. Andrei was going to become a shoe merchant, but he was told that he could not smile to clients. Yes, he knew how to smile earlier, only the time of no-laugh had come. He had health problems, the same as I, and we needed to educate our son ... That's how it all came together, he flew off the handle once, twice, this trial began. He went to court - he hoped that they would give him a fine, but they gave a real term. It was a blow. ”
Andrei had many friends in Ratamka, they were all at the funeral.
The judge grinned at the words about enhanced nutrition
Alena Tsiareshchanka is going with the help of human rights activists to file a complaint against the judges of the Minsk District Court, who in May considered her husband’s appeal against the sentence. The woman believes that the judges could better study the situation, take into account the illness of her husband, but for some reason did not believe him and thus deprived of a chance.
“In the courtroom, there were three judges, the prosecutor and me. Andrei, of course, was not brought, there was no lawyer either. Where could we money to pay the lawyer? Those 250 rubles that they had collected for me in the village for a lawyer went to his other services, including the drafting of a complaint, but they did not speak of being present at the appeal. The woman judge read the case. When I got to the place that you need enhanced nutrition, she grinned. The prosecutor was against the change of sentence. The judges went to consult and returned 10 minutes later: “Refuse to satisfy the complaint”. Alena Tsiareshchanka believes that this decision of the appeals board took the last chance to survive away from her husband.
After that, Alena was in Zhodzina, she saw in what state her husband was. She raised the alarm. However, it took certain time to transfer him to the Valadarka detention facility, to start the treatment , and then it was already too late.
The Department of Corrections of the Ministry of the Interior confirmed the death of prisoner Andrei Tsiareshchanka in the hospital in the Valadarski Street detention facility on May 23, but they did not answer the question whether an inspection would be conducted.
The Zhodzina prison number 8 gave no comments.