Judge Natalya Kholodenko of the Serov District Court in Russia’s Sverdlovsk region sentenced police officer Vladimir Greb in an abuse-of-power case. Greb’s lawyer, Olga Dyachkova, told Mediazona that he received a five-year suspended sentence.
Investigators said it was proven that in August 2025 the officer struck detainee Anatoly Shushakov. Afterward, doctors diagnosed the man with a rupture of the mesentery of the small intestine. Prosecutors argued that the victim had suffered grievous bodily harm and asked the court to sentence Greb to 13 years in a maximum-security penal colony.
The court, however, softened the legal assessment of the charges: the judge removed the qualification related to grievous bodily harm. According to the defense, Shushakov had previously been convicted multiple times and was under administrative supervision.
According to Greb’s lawyer, at around midnight on August 23, 2025, a patrol unit saw Shushakov drinking outside with others even though, under the terms of his supervision, he was supposed to be at home. After he was detained and placed in the police vehicle, he allegedly tried to climb out of the detainee compartment, attempted to kick Greb, tore off one of his shoulder boards, and headbutted him in the forehead.
Shushakov was later given a three-year suspended sentence for those actions. In court, Greb said he had accepted Shushakov’s apology and did not insist on a harsh punishment for him.
Dyachkova told Mediazona that once at the police station, an intoxicated Shushakov threatened the officer’s family, saying he would find them and retaliate against them. She said this left Greb in “a state of agitation, anger, perhaps,” after which he began striking the detainee.
Twenty-eight hours later, Shushakov complained of severe abdominal pain. He was taken to a hospital, where doctors diagnosed a rupture of the mesentery of the small intestine. Greb’s defense argued in court that the detainee could have sustained those injuries because he was heavily intoxicated and fell repeatedly both during the detention and later at the police station.