Rasulov couple gets long prison terms for assaulting policeman at Moscow market
MOSCOW. May 30 (Interfax) - The Moscow City Court on Friday sentenced Magomed and Khalimat Rasulov to 18 and 12.5 years of imprisonment, respectively, after finding them guilty of attacking criminal investigation officers as they were trying to arrest a suspected rapist at the Matveyevsky market in Moscow last July, according to the resolution in the judge's verdict, an Interfax correspondent said.
During the trial the couple pleaded guilty only to one count: causing non life-endangering harm to policeman Anton Kudryashov. The defendants said that at the time of causing him bodily injuries they were unaware that he was a representative of the authorities. In all, three police officers were classified as victims in the case.
According to the inquiry, on July 27, 2013, criminal investigation officers were trying to arrest suspected rapist Magomed Magomedov at the Matveyevsky market in western Moscow, but several stall vendors, including the Rasulov couple, offered fierce resistance to the operatives. As a result, one of the investigators, Kudryashov, sustained a severe disfigurement.
Two local police patrol officers, who were present at the scene, failed to provide help to their colleague and were later found guilty of negligence under the Russian Criminal Code and dismissed from the police.
In late October, the former police officers, Vladimir Cherezov and Yury Lunkov, who had witnessed the assault on the operative, were found guilty of negligence. The Nikulinsky district court of Moscow sentenced each to one year at a medium-security prison.
On May 7 the Moscow City Court found Magomedov, who was the cause of the conflict with police at the market, guilty of rape and sentenced him to 14 years of imprisonment.
Commenting on the verdict, Russian Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin told Interfax: "Now this married couple will feel first-hand that such crimes do not remain unpunished, and this will serve a good lesson to anyone willing to raise their hand against representatives of law and order."