More policemen confess to corruption online

Russia's Interior Ministry is investigating charges of police corruption made by Russian police officer Aleksey Dymovsky. Meanwhile, more revelations are surfacing on the Internet of corruption in the police.

An ever-increasing number of former law-enforcement officers are posting videos online, talking about the lawlessness and corruption in the services they worked for.

The wave of whistle-blowing has grown as all of the men say this is the only way they can get their message across.

“I'm sick of the fact that we are being made to detect crimes which were never committed, sick of pre-ordered criminal cases which we are told to begin just to send certain people to jail,” Dymovsky said in his video address.

“I have proof prosecutors I worked with fabricated evidence in a number of criminal cases, and sent innocent people to jail. I testified in court, I wrote letters – useless,” former deputy prosecutor Grigory Chekalin’s told online later.

Major Aleksey Dymovsky, who was the first to post his video confession on the web, was fired from his job this week for slander. He says he is also facing charges of abuse of office and fraud. Aleksey does not even try to claim he is innocent.

“I have been fabricating documents for four years – often to write off money,” he told RT. “Of course, bosses would not write those papers themselves and they made us do it, but I have their signatures on a number of forged papers.”

“And whenever auditors came to check us, we would welcome them with expensive gifts, paid hotel accommodation, prostitutes – everything, and they would leave,” Dymovsky added.

The former officer said that even if he has to go to jail he will drag all his bosses down with him.

Aleksey's police department says he is lying but Russia's Interior Ministry has sent a special commission to the Krasnodar region, set up to carry out a complex internal check of police departments there.

“He was serving in the rank of major – he's not a novice,” said Interior Ministry spokesperson Oleg Elnikov. “He should know that if it turns out his accusations are based only on opinions and personal motives then, naturally, he may be held responsible for his statements.”

The head of the Russian Police Service is surprised Dymovsky had to resort to the Internet, instead of taking his accusations to prosecutors.

Some even doubt whether the series of police confessions were selfless acts and suggest they could be part of a pre-planned campaign.

“Such things don’t happen without somebody giving some kind of permit,” said Boris Kagarlitsky of the Institute of Globalization and Social Movements.

“There is an objective need for the reform of the police forces. Some people at the top react to this need. I am sure there are plenty of obstacles to go forward. That is why we have this campaign now,” he added.

Meanwhile, since the original video post there has been no official reaction to the stream of revelations, but it is beginning to galvanize Russian society.

As luck would have it, the police video confessions started popping up the same week as President Medvedev said in his national address that information technologies could help beat corruption and would lead to more transparency in public services.