Women were forcibly shaved in a women's prison in Primorsky Krai under the pretext of pediculosis.
Members of the Public Monitoring Commission (PMC), following complaints from the mothers of the girls who suffered the injuries, visited Penal Colony No. 10 in the village of Gornoye in Primorsky Krai. The inmates told the PMC members that "the prison's warden, Internal Service Colonel Oksana Gritskova, used threats and insults against the inmates, including on the basis of their ethnicity (calling them 'black foxes'), obscene language, threatening reprisals, and employing various methods of mental and physical humiliation, ordered the women's heads to be forcibly shaved."
According to members of the Public Monitoring Commission (the appeal is in the possession of NeMoskva), one of the girls tried to escape, but prison staff caught her, beat her, and cut her hair. The Public Monitoring Commission members documented signs of physical violence on her body. Other girls also told the Public Monitoring Commission members that they cried and begged the warden not to cut their hair, but she was adamant.
Ultimately, according to members of the Public Monitoring Commission, the girls were forcibly shaved using physical force. Many of the prisoners had previously had beautiful long hair, which they kept clean and tidy. Over the course of two days, September 15 and 16, approximately 50 people in the colony were shaved completely. Management and staff claim they did this because the prisoners had lice.
When asked by human rights activists for an explanation of the incident, prison warden Oksana Gritskova said that no such incident had occurred at the prison, and that it was "the imagination of the prisoners and their relatives."
"There was no pediculosis epidemic, but there were isolated cases. To prevent the infection from spreading throughout the colony, the girls were asked to have their hair shaved, which they voluntarily agreed to. According to the internal regulations, in emergency cases, it is permissible to resort to cutting prisoners' hair for medical reasons," Gritskova noted in her response to the POC members.
However, Gritskova refused to provide medical records indicating the presence of lice in any of the prisoners, citing medical confidentiality. Gritskova also refused to respond to the Public Monitoring Commission's request for such data with the prisoners' permission. However, she did state that the cut hair had been burned, but did not provide a document confirming this.
The POC members were only able to arrive and personally interview the affected prisoners five days after the incident, on September 21, because no one was allowed into the colony due to a quarantine imposed due to pediculosis.
Women who complained of violence by prison staff and administration were subjected to pressure after the inspection. For example, on the morning of September 22, prisoner Diana Kondratyuk called her mother from the prison via the Zona Telecom network and reported that prison warden Gritskova and several other staff members, threatening to send her to solitary confinement, had forced her to sign a document declaring her suicidal, after which she was placed on preventive observation.
In a conversation with members of the Public Monitoring Commission, the girl said that she feared for her life, since Gritskova said that she “would not let her live.”
As former POC member Denis Dzhenzhera told NeMoskva, violations had been recorded in the colony before.
"In the previous convocation, we recorded cases of violence against prisoners, especially those in the strict-custody unit (SCSU), the punishment cells. We received complaints from prisoners and wrote our own to the prosecutor's office, to Ombudsman Tatyana Moskalkova, and to the Federal Penitentiary Service. Colonel Gritskova always resisted our work; she filed a complaint against us with the prosecutor's office. Our inspections were always accompanied by shouting and scandals: you went to the wrong place, you don't have the right to do this, and so on. Those in the SCSU always actively complain, recounting incidents of violence and beatings, even to the point that Gritskova herself personally participated in beating a prisoner with a shoulder belt. Those in ordinary conditions complain less; they tend to lower their eyes and, with fear and hints, try to convey that all is not well in the colony," the human rights activist noted.
Photo: Denis Dzhenzhera
