PSEUDO-LEGAL HARASSMENT IN POST-SOVIET STATES: Vilkaste–Vaskevics case
Working for more than ten years as a criminal defence attorney in Latvia, I had a chance to monitor an interesting tendency – how the legal system may be used, or rather abused, in order to virtually destroy a particular person – be it a political opponent, a businessman or simply a person, unwilling to pay the “rent” to special services to get protection. It is legally interesting to watch, how the deficiencies of the legal system allow persecuting people for years, conducting unstoppable chain of various procedural actions – for the targets of such persecution this is, however, not an interesting legal casus, but a nightmare.
As a particularly bright example of such pseudo-legal persecution, one can mention the Vilkaste– Vaskevics case. In their case all deficiencies of the law-enforcement system are brought to the extreme; it is evident that the careers and lives of people are easily run over by a machinery of the so-called special services. The background of the case is wellknown from the Latvian and international media – Inara Vilkaste, a successful business woman, was targeted by criminals under the cover of their supporters in special services with a purpose to extort over 7 million euro from her; the same criminals were in turn used by the same officers of special services in order to both legally and physically destroy Vladimirs Vaskevics, a high-ranking official of State Revenue Service in his capacity fighting against black economy (money laundering, contraband) – and thus hindering the profit-making of politically covered criminals. Such qui pro quo cooperation between criminals and officers of special services is only possible due to shortcomings of the legislation – and perhaps, these shortcomings are not occasional. These shortcomings allowed to wiretap Vilkaste and Vaskevics for years, to use false testimonies of criminals in order to fabricate numerous criminal cases against both, to organize black PR campaign in the media, and in general, to turn life of both and their children into a nightmare.
Fishing expedition
The best definition of the term „fishing expedition” in its broader meaning is „any inquiry carried on without any clearly defined plan or purpose in the hope of discovering useful information.” During the Soviet times there was a rather sad and cynical joke that sounded: „If there is a person, the section of the law would be found”, meaning that any person may be held liable for something the law-enforcement agencies would wish. Both of the expressions are directly applicable to the Vilkaste–Vaskevics case. For years both Inara Vilkaste and Vladimirs Vaskevics were wiretapped and followed by a powerful special service called Corruption Prevention and Combating bureau (the KNAB). Numerous searches were performed in their place of residence. Many of their friends, acquaintances and even people very remotely connected to them were subjected to pressure in order to extract false incriminating evidence against both. The purpose of these actions was NOT to investigate any crime that really have occurred but to find any slightest possibility for holding the particular persons liable for the imaginary crimes. The practice to investigate not the crime but the person is prohibited in all civilized jurisdictions and, by the way, also in Latvia… Allegedly. From legal point of view the fishing expedition against Vilkaste and Vaskevics contains of two aspects – lawful activities and unlawful activities. In the end also a possibility of the law-enforcement agencies to conduct unlawful activities is also attributed to the deficiencies of the law, but primarily I would like to discuss one block of Latvian normative acts, which I call the „Bermuda triangle”, that allows for lawful fishing against the particular person. The European Court of Human rights has stated in an old and classic case of Malone v. the United Kingdom and reiterrated in many other cases regarding secret surveillance, that powers exercised in secret entail evident risks of arbitrariness, and therefore the State must take all measures to provide for strong control mechanism to exclude possibility of abuse. Unfortunately, this is not the case in Latvia, and there are particular bright examples of such lack of control. It is allowed in Latvia to conduct secret surveillance of the person outside any criminal proceedings against him or her, even if the basis for such secret surveillance is an allegation that a person committed or plans to commit a crime. The „Investigatory Operations Law”provides literally: „If the body performing investigatory operations has at its disposal information with respect to specific persons (including where obtained as a result of an investigatory examination) and it provides a sufficient basis to suspect such persons of planning or committing a criminal offence or threatening interests of importance to the State, or such persons are being sought with respect to a criminal offence already committed, investigatory process shall be initiated with respect to such persons.” This effectively means that any secret service may order „investigatory operations” without initiating the criminal proceedings against any person that they consider „planning or committing a crime” depriving the person of any rights and guarantees, inherent for criminal proceedings, for example, not to incriminate oneself. The term of such „investigatory operations” is rather broad: „The term for investigatory process in such matters is six months, which may be further extended for six months with the approval of the head or deputy head of the body performing investigatory operations. A further extension of the term may be done only with the approval of the Prosecutor General or a prosecutor specially authorized by the Prosecutor General, but it shall not be for more than the limitation period of the crime in relation to which the investigatory process is being conducted.” This means 6 months, plus 6 months, plus indefinite period, not longer than limitation period for the alleged crime which is from 2 to 15 years depending on the gravity of the alleged offence. The constitutional rights of person, though, may be limited only on basis of the judicial consent of a special judge of the Supreme Court. The term of such measures (including secret surveillance) is also broadly defined in the law: „Permission to perform such investigatory operations measures may be issued for a period of up to three months and may be extended where it is substantiated that it is necessary, but only for the period of time that the investigatory process is being carried out with respect to the person.”
Therefore, again, up to 15 years.
Moreover the law does not prohibit the secret service from initiation of new „investigatory processes” against the same persons, thus avoiding yet the vague time limits provided in the law. Finally, under the „Law on State Secret”, everything connected with investigatory operations is considered state secret, including the content of the information so obtained. The object of the secret surveillance, therefore, has no chance to learn about the FACT of the surveillance performed against him in the past, and the CONTENT of the information gained, may not use it in court for self-defence (most of the judges also do not have access to State secret and cannot verify the information the authorities rely on in accusing a person), and may not effectively challenge the legality of such information. To summarize all above stated on practical grounds: imagine a person, for some reasons, be it political, financial or personal reason, being disliked by some of the secret services leading officers. The „investigatory process” can be started against this person for a virtually indefinite period of time, conducting a clear cut „fishing expedition” with the purpose of interpreting each word that this person says in private conversations for initiation of numerous criminal proceedings against him or her. Furthermore, imagine that some of the officers so empowered are connected with the criminals and submit these criminals with information gathered during secret surveillance. What options does the object of such prosecution have to protect him or herself? In practice none. In 2013 Latvia has lost a case under Art. 6 of the European Convention. In Baltiņš v. Latvia the ECHR has acknowledged that the court failed to examine information gained as a result of the investigative process against a person and thus deprived him of his rights for defense. This is probably the first notice the ECHR has taken about the secret service and secret surveillance situation in Latvia. In a very recent case of Ternovskis v. Latvia ECHR again touched upon the related issues of extensive state secrecy of everything in Latvia, the non-transparency of the processes within the Prosecutor General’s office and inability of person to know what information is gathered against him or her by the authorities. Hopefully this tendency will continue and ECHR will more actively involve itself in solving problems of Latvian law. Vilkaste and Vaskevics have also turned to ECHR for help, notifying of many violations of human rights and hoping that ECHR looks closer at the „peculiarities” of Latvian law. We have discussed two corners of the „Bermuda triangle” – the „Investigatory Operations Law” and the law „On state secret”, which are not amended for years – and on purpose, so that give wide powers to special services and their agents. But these two corners would not form a triangle without the third – and this is special services themselves. The so-called „State Security Services” under the law are: Constitution Protection Bureau (SAB), Military Police (MP) and Securty Police (DP). The similar competence is granted to one very special service – the KNAB, officially not included into the list of „State Security Services”, but, by virtue of wide powers and lack of control from any supervising institution, it is equally „special” as the fourth State Security Services listed in the „Law on State Security Services”. So, although officially there are three „State Security Services”, KNAB must also be added to this list in practice. Thus, we speak about four powerful „secret services” of a police nature in a country of less than two million people (this is apart of regular police forces).
Why does Latvia need so many secret services?
The answer is clear – the more secret services there are, the easier it is to control the people. I think that we speak about political control – and yet another reason, which stands behind all processes in the modern world – greed for money. Sadly, but the Vilkaste–Vaskevics case proves also this statement to be true. It must be borne in mind that in a country as small as Latvia the ties between people working in different secret services and police and prosecutor’s offices are very close. They either come from the same background (most of KNAB leading people come from the Security Police), or they are relatives (former deputy head of KNAB, Ms.Juta Striķe, considered by many to be the factual head of KNAB, is married to one of the leading officers of the Military Police, Mr. Maigurs Striķis) and this makes the cooperation between the secret services so close on both official and non-official, corruptive level, that it becomes a real problem. So, let’s imagine that a group of people working in different special services, totally uncontrolled by any independent body, decide to destroy a career of a successful, but unaccommodating state servant, who holds a key position in a very interesting sphere for criminals – customs and financial crimes. This state servant is implementing the reforms that would substantially cut the profit from money laundering, contraband etc. This state servant is fighting corruption – and is unwilling to cooperate with the „right people” from the special services. He even institutes investigations into the activities of the special services officers. He is definitely dangerous and needs to be destroyed. When the target is chosen, the fishing expedition against Vladimirs Vaskevics is launched. The same happens with the mother of his children, Inara Vilkaste – she is targeted for a simple reason – extortion of 7,5 millions euro. The methods in both cases are the same – physical threats, blackmail, initiation of criminal cases, wiretapping and, last but not least, defamation campaign in the media. The latter is easy to organize, using the controlled journalists – making „loud” searches, leakages of non-existing evidence, forged records of the conversations etc. In the beginning the targets do not understand, what is happening? They still think that law-enforcement agencies are there in order to protect them. It takes years to come to the conclusion, that Latvian legal system looks as being tailor made for the corrupt and criminal officers of the secret services to facilitate the abuse of lawful methods in order to achieve unlawful goals. At current several applications on behalf of Inara Vilkaste and Vladimirs Vaskevics are pending before ECHR, raising serious problems of Latvian law and practice. Both are confident that if European legal and political community will not hear their stories and ask questions to Latvian partners, they will not be able to get their lives back.
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