Aggrieved party in Nemtsov murder case sees crime as not solved – lawyer

Boris Nemtsov file photo

MOSCOW. June 6 (Interfax) – The aggrieved party in the case dealing with the murder of opposition politician Boris Nemtsov sees the crime as not solved, as the investigation has not identified those who ordered and organized it, even though there is every opportunity for this, a lawyer said.

“Those who ordered and who organized the crime must be identified and held responsible. The investigation has suffered a complete fiasco here, possibly a deliberate one,” Vadim Prokhorov, a lawyer representing Nemtsov’s daughter, Zhanna Nemtsova, said at a hearing at the Moscow District Military Court.

In particular, Ruslan Mukhudinov, who has been declared wanted as the suspected organizer of Nemtsov’s murder, could not have been such, which is evident both from the testimony provided by the housemaid at the apartment where the defendants had lived or visited, and from the testimony provided by Zaur Dadayev, the suspected killer, Prokhorov said.

“He [Mukhudinov] is directly related to the murder, but only as a link between the organizers and the perpetrators of the crime. This is a man without his own resources and without his own clout in this society, unlike his employer and patron Ruslan Geremeyev,” Prokhorov said.

The motive for this contract killing was not just the desire to make a profit, but an order from more authoritative members of society, Prokhorov said. “It’s been ordered by seniors. In this particular case, not just by those who are older but by those who are higher in the hierarchy and social status,” he said.

“We are dealing with a traditional society with a very clearly organized hierarchic structure,” which “can explain the specifics of the defendants’ behavior to a large extent,” he said.

The defense also insists that Russia’s leadership is responsible for creating an atmosphere in society in which Nemtsov’s murder was possible.

“Whom did his life affect so painfully, so bitterly and so intolerably that he had to be gotten rid of? In our view, the answer is obvious. This is the incumbent authorities, and it’s necessary to look for an answer there,” lawyer Olga Mikhailova said, adding that her words concerned both Moscow and Grozny.

Nemtsov was assassinated on Bolshoi Moskvoretsky Bridge in immediate proximity to the Kremlin on February 27, 2015.

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