“The Prosecutor General’s Office does not agree with the acquittal of the former head of the SBU department in Khmelnytskyi region, Viktor Kraitor, and his subordinate, an employee of the “Alfa” special unit, Vitaly Taradai, who were accused of murdering an elderly woman and wounding participants of a peaceful protest on February 19, 2014. This is stated in the material of the Glavkom. The Prosecutor General’s Office noted that a cassation case is currently being prepared”, — write on: ua.news
The Prosecutor General’s Office does not agree with the acquittal of the former head of the SBU department in Khmelnytskyi region, Viktor Kraitor, and his subordinate, an employee of the “Alfa” special unit, Vitaly Taradai, who were accused of murdering an elderly woman and wounding participants of a peaceful protest on February 19, 2014.
This is stated in the material of the Glavkom.
The Prosecutor General’s Office noted that a cassation appeal to the Supreme Court is currently being prepared. Law enforcement officers have three months to appeal the decision of the appeals court, which upheld the acquittal in the Kraitor-Taraday case.
At the same time, the department of the Prosecutor General’s Office, which investigates crimes related to the mass protests of 2013-2014, admitted the fact of the loss of one of the physical evidences in the case. It is about a metal object removed by an investigator in a medical institution from the leg of one of the injured protesters.
This gap was established back in 2014, when the investigation was carried out by the Khmelnytskyi Prosecutor’s Office for the supervision of compliance with laws in the military sphere.
“In 2017, the pre-trial investigation was transferred to the Department of Special Investigations of the General Prosecutor’s Office of Ukraine. According to the results of the official investigation, in 2017, a responsible investigator was identified, who was brought to disciplinary action. At the same time, the absence of one piece of material evidence did not mean the absence of an evidence base. The accusation was based on a set of other proper and admissible evidence, which was examined by courts of all instances,” the Prosecutor General’s Office noted.
We will remind, on February 19, 2014, a peaceful protest was held near the building of the SBU administration in Khmelnytskyi. After the situation escalated, unknown persons began to break the windows of the glass doors of the building, after which the security forces gave the order to use firearms, citing the threat of an assault.
As a result of the shooting, 72-year-old rally participant Lyudmila Sheremet was killed, and about ten other people were injured of varying degrees of severity. On the same day, late in the evening, 21-year-old student Dmytro Pahor died near the regional SBU office, but this episode was not included in the Kraitor-Taradai case.
The former head of the SBU of Khmelnytskyi, Viktor Kraitor, and Alfa employee Vitaly Taradai pleaded not guilty.
Kraitor stated that on the eve of the tragedy, he received information about a possible assault on the management of a group of up to 200 people. According to him, on the morning of February 19, he held a meeting where he emphasized the need for strict adherence to the law when using weapons.
According to Kraitor, under the cover of the rally, the capture of the SBU administration was allegedly planned, and its employees reported on the production of “Molotov cocktails” near the building.
He noted that he personally gave the order to fire warning shots in a “safe direction” to avoid a ricochet after protesters began smashing the windows of the central entrance.
In court, Kraitor emphasized that the territory of the SBU administration is the territory of a military unit, where state secrets were kept and government communications were located.
Vitaly Taradai confirmed that he and his colleague fired several shots into the “dead end of the right column”, from where, according to him, it was impossible to ricochet. He later heard a long line of shots, but said he did not know who fired the shots.
The first-instance court came to the conclusion that the investigation conducted the pre-trial investigation improperly and biasedly, allowing significant violations of the requirements of the Criminal and Criminal Procedure Codes of Ukraine, which led to the recognition of the evidence as inadmissible. The loss of important evidence was also ascertained.
The Court of Appeal agreed with these findings and upheld the acquittal.
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