Deadlock of Investigation in Zestafoni Police Department

Journalistic Survey

Nona Dograshvili, a resident of the village of Meore Sviri in the Zestafoni District, appealed to the Human Rights Center for help. She said that her husband, Rostom Khidasheli, died on July 2 2006 at the Zestaponi railway line in the performance of his work as a security officer. More than one year has passed since the accident, but the investigation still has not been finished. Consequently, a court hearing on the case has not yet been held.

Rostom Khidasheli was a policeman of the Zestafoni Security Department within the Security Police for Transport Facilities, which is a Public Legal Entity within the Ministry of Internal Affairs. A criminal investigation on his death was launched at the Zestafoni District Police Department on same day. There is a report from the General Inspection dated February 20, 2007 that describes the events that occurred soon after the accident.

“At 10:35 PM on July 2, 2006, freight train # 2018 38 entered railway line # 5 of the Zestafoni Railway Station. In order to examine the locks on the carriages, the train was led to the line # 5. Thus, at 10: 50 PM Tariel Sharvadze, on duty at the depot, switched off the contact to that line and recorded this in a special journal. Afterwards, Rostom Khidasheli went to check the carriages. Having climbed on the carriage he got electrocuted and died instantly.

A preliminary investigation into the case was launched by the Zestafoni Police Department under article 170, paragraph II of the Georgian Criminal Code. The case was given # 520624. The day at which the technical inquiry into the death would start was set on July 8 2006. The inquiry would investigate who had breached the regulations at the Zestafoni Railway Station. According to conclusion # 3042/15 of the National Expertise Bureau for the Court within the Georgian Ministry of Justice, dated by October 27 2006, the train stopped on line # 5, but not in the zone for which electricity was switched off. Train # 2018 was to be carefully watched and controlled and it was to be checked whether the train was led to the line correctly and whether the section line was really switched off. According to the investigation, the engineer and his assistant, as well as the station and depot personnel on-duty that night shall be charged for the accident. Consequently, Rostom Khidasheli is not considered to be responsible for the breaches of the regulations.

Although the above-mentioned investigation was conducted, the family, who is left without a bread-winner, has received any assistance. The widow, Nona Dograshvili, receives vague answers to her questions from the District Police Department and the Prosecutor’s Office. Valeri Chachua, the head of Zestafoni Railway Station, was very rude in answering the questions of the widow and her sister-in-law, Izo Khidasheli. The women demanded Chachua to live up to his promise. He had promised the family to assign them a pension for the children as well as some other assistance.

The family of the Rostom Khidasheli considers that the reason for the prolonged investigation is that investigators want to protect the criminals.

“Soon after the accident, the board of the railway station came to visit and promised to assist us in everything if we did not start an investigation into the case; they promised to grant pensions to our children. We understand that Rostom was not killed with premeditation. So I accepted their proposal, because we had no income and we started to wait for their financial assistance. However, more than one year has passed and nobody has granted us any financial help. In fact, they made us keep silent and arranged the situation at the police station in their favor. Now I will not be surprised if they declare that my husband is guilty because he incapable of defending himself. However, are not they afraid of the God? They have left my only child hungry,” said Nona Dograshvili in her conversation with the Human Rights Center.

Gela Tsitelashvili, investigator for the Zestafoni District Police Station, who is in charge of the case, considers that the real reason of the prolonged investigation is its complicated and special character.

“We carried out the investigation twice and demanded many materials from various bodies in order to receive the exact information of what happened,” said Tsitelashvili.

However, the investigator could not make comments on whether a specific person would be investigated, only because the police are indifferent about the outcomes. He said that information is confidential.

Gela Tsitelashvili stated that the only results of the investigation the family has received are the conclusions of the General Inspection. “The conclusions of the General Inspection are not valid evidence in the criminal case and we cannot charge a person on the grounds of those conclusions.”

Based on a few comments made by the investigator, the Human Rights Center has concluded that according to the investigation the only person responsible for the accident is the person who designed Zestafoni Railway Station (?!); however it seems that the investigator and the head of the station cannot agree on the date the station was designed. The investigator claimed that the railway station was designed in 1933 and the mistake originates from that time; but Valeri Chachua, the head of the station, claims that “the station has operated in this way since 1995.”

The main problem which caused the accident on line # 5 was the location of the traffic lights and so-called section switches. Before July 2, 2006 the switches were installed inside traffic lights and the train stopped between the traffic lights. The person on duty at the rime also confirmed this. Despite this fact, half of the carriage stopped outside of the switched off section of line # 5. The situation has been this way for a long time and has remained until finally the mistake resulted in this accident. After the accident, the line was reconstructed the switches were installed outside the traffic lights. Consequently, it is no longer dangerous to work on the train between traffic lines. However, the person responsible for the flaw in the design of the railway line, is still unknown. According to the investigator there is a logical explanation for this: “Until enough materials are gathered to prove the guilt of a specific person or group of people, we will not be able to give exact answers. But generally, I can tell you that the investigation will end around the end of this month. Many people were interrogated and we have a large amount of case materials. When we have enough documents and find the person who is guilty for the accident, we will let you know how we will proceed with the case,” said Tsitelashvili.

Although the investigator claimed that they have finished interrogations and gathered a large amount of materials, he is not sure about his conclusions. Former colleague and friend of the late Rostom Khidasheli, Revaz Khuskivadze, said in his conversation with the Human Rights Center that the investigator has not questioned him since his initial interrogation on the night of the accident. However, the investigator claims that he has questioned Khuskivadze several times.

Khuskivadze describes the situation at the railway station on the night of the accident as follows: “When the electricity on the line was switched off by the on-duty person at the depot, we did not know whether he checked it before or afterwards. But he called us to tell us he had switched the electricity off and we could start working. Thus we were not afraid to work there and never suspected that the electricity was on.”

The employees of the railway station cannot explain how everything happened. Khuskivadze said that:

“I was standing fifty meters away from the place of the accident. I was on duty in the depot. I heard people shouting and saying Rostom was lying on the roof of the carriage. I climbed up on the roof and noticed a small scratch on his face. I though he had slipped and fallen down. I thought he was simply unconscious. We carried him down on the ground and took him to the hospital. There they told us he was dead. In Kutaisi we were told that he was electrocuted.”

The Human Rights Center got interested in the activities of Zestafoni Security Department for the Defense of Transport Facilities. Gela Meskhi, the head of the department, was not in the office when a representative of the Center visited his office. Since our conversation with Khuskivadze, we decided to ask a department’s official several questions. We asked for the head of the unit, but as soon as he heard we wanted to speak about Khidasheli he ran away and insulted us. He warned his employees about speaking with us. That person did not tell us his name, but we later found out his surname; it is Nodar Talakvadze. We could not understand the reason for his anger.

Afterwards, the Human Rights Center met with Valeri Chachua, the head of Zestafoni Railway Station. He looked very confused while he was answering our questions.

Valeri Chachua: “I, as a specialist, think that everybody was responsible for the accident happening.

Journalist: Who do you mean by everybody?

V. CH:  How can I blame a specific person? I do not know who is guilty. The station has operated this way ever since 1995. I think the designers are also to blame. The dead policeman was guilty for the accident too.

J: Was he obligated to check whether the electricity was switched off or not?

V. Ch:  He must have known.

J: He must have known; but as we were informed the person on duty at the depot should have warmed him whether the electricity was cut off or not. Only after being warned he could get on the train.

V. Ch: He was obligated to let him work…

J: I cannot understand what you mean.

V. Ch: Initially the line should have been switched off and then he should have been allowed to work.

J: And who was responsible to switch off the line and allow that man to work there? Khidasheli could not order himself to work there.

V. Ch: Our employees could not order to climb on the train, because it is not in our regulations. We handed our regulations to the prosecutor and the investigator. They are investigating whether that man was responsible for getting on the train and checking whether it was safe to do so. As far as we know, Khidasheli should not have been there himself. The police report states he should have stayed at least two meters away from the electricity wires. He should have climbed up the stairs and looked inside the carriage without getting on the roof of the train. The regulations state the same too.

J: Was there not anybody present who checks whether employees abide by the regulations?

V. Ch: The police department should investigate whether there was a supervisor present. That man worked on a high altitude and he must have had special permission to do so.

J: But it was not the first time he climbed up there.

V. Ch: Of course, I do not want to blame somebody. We did not want to be exclude anybody form our investigation in order not to discredit a person and to grant a pension to somebody ill-deserving.

J: But he did not receive that pension.

V. CH: No, he did receive it. We assisted his family once and assigned a pension of 38 lari for his child.

J: If a person dies in the street, his/her child also receives a pension of 38 lari, every orphan does; so it was not any special financial assistance from you to his family. As far as I know you should have granted his child with a compensation equal to the salary the man received from the station.

V. Ch: I have heard that the law has changed and the child only gets 38 lari.

J: As you have already said, the dead man knew that there was a high voltage running through the wires. Do you think he knew that climbing on the train could put his life in danger? Based on his behavior we can guess that he did not know.

V. Ch: He did know; I know that he did know. I do not want to discredit the dead person and blame somebody else. There are people who can prove that he knew it.

J: Who are those people, witnesses?

V. Ch: The Prosecutor’s Office will find it out.

J: According to our information you have dismissed the widow of the man in a very rude manner…

V. Ch: Of course I did not. I know they can blame me for everything. I will never insult that woman if she comes here; as for her brother, he threatens to attack my family. I promised him I would resign if the court finds me guilty for the accident. We want to assist the family; I personally visited the family and told them that we had found some people who could be blamed for the accident but the fact is that none of them intended to kill that man. I promised to help the family in anyway we could and we have kept our promise. Then somebody bothered the family members of the poor man by telling them there were some unregistered carriages there. If I were a murderer, should I have visited that family? I went there and promised to help them. We will assist them in the future too. If I am found guilty, I promise to resign.

Niko Kankava, a lawyer for the Human Rights Center, explains how the legal investigation was conducted and to what extent the rights of the family members were protected. “Until I investigate the case materials in detail I can only say that the Sasha Khidasheli, father of the dead man, is mentioned in case materials as a victim and not as an heir of the victim (the dead person in this particular case) for the court; similar regulation is envisaged under the Criminal Procedural Code Article 68 paragraph II). Based on those fact we can conclude that the investigation started by mistakes. Besides that, two investigations were carried out on the case and the heir was not informed about the planned investigations as well as their conclusions. Consequently, his rights were violated. After I get involved in the investigation as a lawyer we will draw our attention to those violations. I hope after the investigation is finished, the family will receive a positive decision.”

Since the Human Rights Center got interested in the case, Tsitelashvili promised to finish the investigation at the end of October. The Center hopes that the deadlock of the investigation will finally end and we will find out why the process took so long, even though a lot materials were collected for 16 months. We will also learn who Zestafoni Police station wanted to protect.

The Human Rights Center is going to work on the case.

Shorena Kakabadze, Kutaisi