Stop the Untouchables. Justice for Sergei Magnitsky.

Exclusive: Briton who took on Sergei Magnitsky network faces libel case in UK

The Independent

A former Moscow police officer is suing a British businessman who exposed how a network of corrupt officials and shadowy criminal underworld figures were behind the largest tax fraud in Russian history.

Lieutenant Colonel Pavel Karpov has launched libel and defamation proceedings in the High Court against William Browder, a millionaire hedge-fund magnate who has campaigned against corruption within the Russian government after his lawyer Sergei Magnitsky was tortured and died in police custody.

The 35-year-old officer, who was until recently a Moscow and Interior Ministry investigator, is one of more than 60 Russian officials who Mr Browder has publicly accused of being behind a scam that led to the theft of $230million from the Russian tax payer. Mr Browder has also accused him of being among a group of police officers who arranged for the arrest and torture of Mr Magnitsky when he uncovered the scam and went public with his allegations.

If the case ends up in the High Court, it will shed a spotlight on a scandal that has become a source of major international embarrassment to the Kremlin because of the mounting evidence that prominent officials within the Interior Ministry, tax offices and the judiciary aided the scam.

Mr Karpov insists he had nothing to do with the fraud or the subsequent cover up – or the arrest, torture and death of Mr M. In court documents obtained by The Independent Lawyers from Olswang, the major London law-firm which represents the former detective, say the allegations made by Mr Browder have caused “serious hurt, embarrassment and distress.”

They insist that while Mr Browder’s quest to pursue those who killed Mr Magnitsky might be legitimate, his campaign has wrongfully made false and highly defamatory claims against their client including that he is complicit in fraud, torture, kidnapping and murder.