Punctured Lungs, Ruptured Liver, and Sex with a Minor: What's Happening Inside the Belarusian Police and How Superiors Are Hiding It

A 'Dead Zone' in Salihorsk and Collusion with a Forensic Expert

A resident of Salihorsk complained to the police that an acquaintance had taken her headphones. The suspect, a 41-year-old local resident named Rahalevich, was brought to the district police department (RUUS). In the duty room, he began to argue, for which his arms were twisted, he was hit in the shin, and handcuffed. A few hours later, the man was taken to intensive care with a broken seventh rib, a punctured lung, and a broken nose. He told the doctors that he had been beaten by the police.

In the leaked audio recordings, it is revealed that the detainee was beaten in a corridor between the duty unit and the temporary detention facility (ICU), where cameras do not reach. To save his subordinates from a criminal case, the superior decided to simulate the situation with a loyal expert.

"We are going with the approach that this was a lawful use of physical force. Tomorrow, a competent forensic expert will determine if such injuries can be sustained, and we will simulate this situation with his participation. And the fact that he consumes vodka instead of calcium and has weak bones—well, that's just how it is," one of the police officials instructs his colleagues.

Liver Rupture Near Petrykau: "We Didn't Hit the Liver"

In the village of Chalyushchavichy, Petrykau district, a mother called the police on her son, Radzinovich, who had broken windows in the house. The head of the criminal investigation department, Mitskevich, and operational officer Serapin came to pick him up. The man was put into the car without handcuffs, but on the way, he allegedly tried to jump out while it was moving. The police officers used force.

At 6:30 PM, the detainee was locked in the temporary detention facility (ICU). But then something happened that at 3:30 AM, Radzinovich had to undergo surgery in the hospital for a ruptured liver lobe. The victim reported being beaten, but the police reports state that force was used according to instructions and "no one hit the liver."

Meanwhile, as "Bypol" notes, while law enforcement officers are forgiven for severe injuries to detainees, a mother of two children from neighboring Mazyr was recently given two years in a penal colony for a simple "insult" to an OBEZ (Department for Combating Economic Crimes) officer.

Knife to the Chest from a "Convicted Monster" in Maladzyechna

Another story from the leaked conversations concerns Major Ilya Hryntsevich — Deputy Head of the Maladzyechna District Police Department's Temporary Detention Facility (ICU) for operational work. Despite the officer being married with a family, he had an affair with a woman he himself had previously supervised and guarded in the isolation facility cells.

One morning before duty, between seven and eight o'clock, the police officer visited his mistress's home. In the apartment, an argument erupted between them due to jealousy, and the former detainee stabbed the major directly in the chest, puncturing his lung.

While Hryntsevich was in the hospital, the police superiors racked their brains on how to hide the scandal. The situation was complicated by the fact that the officer's mistress was previously convicted (colleagues call her a "convicted monster" in the recordings), and law enforcement officers are strictly forbidden to have any informal ties with such people. To exonerate the major, the leadership even considered a version about "provocation."

Pedophilia in Gomel: "Some Convoy Guard Had Sex with a Girl"

Another recording concerns Gomel, where a 26-year-old convoy guard engaged in intimate correspondence with a 15-year-old schoolgirl. When this came to light, instead of arresting him, the leadership forced him to resign voluntarily. A month later, it was confirmed that the police officer had slept with the girl, but a criminal case was opened against a "civilian" — departmental statistics remained unaffected.

Superiors on the recordings discuss this cynically: "There in Gomel, some convoy guard had sex with a girl..."

Who Goes to Work for the Ministry of Internal Affairs

Alexander Azarov, head of "Bypol," attributes these stories to a staffing shortage following the political purges of 2020. Currently, school graduates with an average grade point average of up to 5 are massively recruited into the police force. Most recruits go to police stations, penal colonies, temporary detention facilities (ICUs), and even become district police officers without basic training (the so-called "initial training"), while more-or-less capable specialists resign after their first five-year contract.

Data on crimes committed by internal affairs officers themselves was classified back in 2018 — summaries regarding personnel stopped being shown even to the police officers themselves. Educational work has been reduced to Soviet rituals: employees are forced to manually rewrite service instructions into notebooks and paste cut-out notes from the police newspaper "Na Straze" (On Guard) into them.

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