DUSHANBE, June 18, 2012, Asia-Plus – The Agency for State Financial Control and Combating Corruption has announced the arrest of former investigator in Nizomkhon Jourayev’s case.
The anticorruption agency deputy chief Millopar Bandishoyev told Asia-Plus Monday morning that the chief detective of the anticorruption agency Saidakhtam Mudinov, who had previously served with the Ministry of Interior and been member of the operational group investigating the criminal case of Nizomkhon Jourayev, has been arrested on suspicion of having misused powers.
“The preliminary investigation has established that misusing powers, Lieutenant-Colonel Mudinov illegally took possession of Nissan Maxima belonging to Nizomkhon Jourayev,” Bandishoyev said, noting that some other facts have also been revealed during the preliminary investigation.
We will recall that investigation into the so-called Isfara Case has been resumed after return of Nizomkhon Jourayev from Moscow. Nizomkhon Jourayev fled to Moscow but was arrested there in 2010 by Moscow police on August 27, 2010 on a Tajik warrant after three years of evading arrest. Earlier this year he resurfaced in Tajikistan under unexplained circumstances and told state media that he had come back to face justice at home.
Nizomkhon Jourayev had been wanted by Tajik police since 2007. He was a successful businessman who owned the chemical plant in the northern city of Isfara. In 2007 investigations were launched into his financial activities, and later in 2008 he was officially accused of ordering assassination of former Deputy Prosecutor-General Tolib Boboyev in 1999.
Criminal proceedings have been instituted against Nizomkhon Jourayev under the provisions of eight articles of Tajikistan’s Penal Code: Article 104 – murder; Article 185 – organization of illegal armed formation; Article 186 – banditry; Article 195 – illegal storage of weapons; Article 245 – embezzlement or misappropriation; Article 262 – money laundering; Article 292 – tax evasion; and Article 340 – document forgery. Nizomkhon Jourayev left the country before his arrest warrant was issued.
On June 9, 2009, the Supreme Court of Tajikistan sentenced 31 associates of Nizomkhon Jourayev to long jail terms. They were sentenced to prison terms between 11 and 25 years, while a prosecutor in the trial of them asked for shorter terms for them.
According to Tajik law enforcement authorities, Nizomkhon Jourayev and his two brothers, Fakhriddin and Tolib, were involved in organizing the assassination of former Deputy Prosecutor-General Tolib Boboyev in 1999.
Jourayev and his associates were also charged with setting up an organized criminal group, tax evasion, and a number of financial crimes.
A number of law enforcement officials, including Shermat Nourov, ex-deputy transportation prosecutor of Tajikistan, and Nour Nourov, judge from the Supreme Court, have been detained after investigation into the Isfara Case has been resumed.
