Investigators in south Siberia’s Altai Territory have brought charges against a police officer who threatened to kill a man over the disappearance of a bicycle, a police source said on Thursday.
“The inebriated officer got into the house of a resident of the village of Ust-Koksa and said he would kill him if he did not admit to stealing a bicycle from another resident,” the source said.
Russia’s underpaid and undertrained police force have come under massive criticism in recent years following a number of attacks on the public.
In the last two years or so, Russian police officers have been charged with beheading a suspect, rape, extortion, burning a suspect alive and using slave labor.
Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliyev used his annual Police Day address to remind police chiefs that officers should point their weapons at criminals, and not aim them at law-abiding citizens. He has also said that citizens should “give as good as they get” if attacked by police officers.
In response to growing criticism, President Dmitry Medvedev ordered a large-scale police reform in December 2009, including cutting the number of policemen and increasing salaries.
MOSCOW, October 28 (RIA Novosti)
