“If my son committed suicide, let them show the video” – Father of a 21-year-old man who died while being investigated at Chilanzar DIA

On May 22, police officers stopped a young man from Surkhandarya in Tashkent and took him to Chilanzar district police station due to the drug found in his possession. Allegedly, 21-year-old Khafizullah Turgunov, who is being interrogated in the DIA building, asked to go to the toilet during the interrogation and tried to escape, throwing himself from the 4th floor. After that, the young man was taken to the emergency department of Uchtepa district, where he lay in a coma for a week and died in the early morning of May 29.

Relatives of the deceased, especially Khafizullah’s disabled father, doubt this version, presented as an official statement of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

“I was shocked after hearing the news that my son threw himself from the 4th floor. Then they said that my son died in a few weeks, I was told to come and collect him. Then I came to Tashkent, and when I went to the hospital, my son’s face was bruised, nothing happened to other parts of his body. The doctor also said that the limb was not broken, nothing happened. I doubt it, my son was strong and young, he was not afraid of prison. I think my only son was beaten to death...

The DIA building has bars on the windows, he won’t fit. If he threw himself, there are cameras – let them show that he threw himself or show his fingerprints. I went to the Tashkent city prosecutor’s office and wrote an application, they said that they cannot show the video surveillance because it is a secret of the investigation.

I am unable to work, my son came to Tashkent to work. He worked in construction and other jobs. I don’t know if he did something wrong. But there is no need to kill someone because of some kind of wrongdoing, they have children too,” Erkin Kholboyev, the father of the deceased, said.

At first, the authorities did not comment on the situation and limited themselves to saying that the prosecutor’s office is investigating the case. After this news was published on the Kun.uz website, the MIA press secretary, Shohrukh Giyasov, made an official statement.

Reportedly, on the morning of May 22, internal affairs officers stopped Kh.T. because he looked suspicious. 53.52 grams of “hashish” narcotic substance was found with him and a case was initiated against him under Article 273 of the Criminal Code.

According to the ministry, on that day, when Khafizullah was being taken to the service room on the 4th floor, he asked to go to the toilet and jumped down from the window to hide from the investigation. “As a result, he received various bodily injuries – he was diagnosed with “closed brain injury, brain contusion, skull fracture, hematoma of body parts”. The Ministry of Internal Affairs also noted that this situation was recorded on the video recording devices installed in the building.

But until now, neither the relatives of the deceased nor the public have been shown the video recording of the 21-year-old man throwing himself from the 4th floor.

Kun.uz reporter went to the Chilanzar district police station and asked to see the toilet window where Khafizullah was said to have dumped himself. The MIA press service did not allow this, saying that the investigation is secret, and the reporter was not allowed into the DIA territory.

Another case that causes doubt is the words of doctors. For example, one of the doctors who worked in that hospital wrote that Khafizullah Turgunov vomited blood, his internal organs were crushed, and his stomach was washed several times.

In addition, other doctors and morgue staff told relatives of the deceased that Khafizullah’s body had no signs of falling from the 4th floor.

The deputy chief doctor of Uchtepa district emergency department, who spoke to Kun.uz reporter, stated that the records related to the deceased’s transportation to the hospital and his health were taken away by the prosecutor’s office. The doctors also said that they will tell about the situation they witnessed in the investigation and in the court.

The PGO press secretary informed that the preliminary conclusion of the forensic examination conducted on the body of the deceased will not be disclosed until the end of the investigations. Currently, the Chilanzar district prosecutor’s office is conducting an investigation into the case.