Moscow jail accused of making defence lawyers strip before client visits

Attorneys report intrusive checkpoint searches

Guards at Moscow’s Pretrial Detention Centre No. 4, commonly known as Medved, have begun requiring defence lawyers to remove underwear during security checks, according to attorney Anastasia Georgievskaya. Meduza reported on September 11 that women were told to remove bras when metal detectors reacted, while at least one male lawyer was required to lower his trousers. The procedures allegedly took place at the ordinary checkpoint rather than in a private search room.

The report describes more than indignity. Lawyers who declined to comply were ultimately prevented from seeing their clients, Georgievskaya said. That consequence potentially turns a security procedure into an obstacle to legal representation: detainees cannot consult counsel when their attorneys must either accept a public, invasive search or leave. Meduza did not report a response from the detention centre, so the jail’s justification, written policy and scope of the practice remain unverified.

A broader pattern of pressure on legal defence

The allegation arrives amid longstanding concern about the operating environment for Russian defence lawyers and prison-rights monitors. In a January 23 communication to Moscow, two UN special rapporteurs described the detention and prosecution of three Yekaterinburg human-rights defenders connected to monitoring prisons and reporting alleged torture and ill-treatment. The communication said one of them, Larisa Zakharova, was a defence lawyer whose work focused on prisoners’ rights.

That UN document concerns different people and a different region, so it does not independently confirm what happened at Medved. It does, however, establish relevant institutional context: international experts have formally raised concerns about pressure on lawyers and monitors working on detention conditions in Russia. The new checkpoint allegations therefore matter both for the treatment of attorneys and for the practical ability of accused people to exercise their defence rights.

Questions for the detention authorities

The immediate test is whether Moscow’s penitentiary administration acknowledges the reported searches, publishes the rule being applied and explains why less intrusive screening would be inadequate. Investigators should also establish how many attorneys were affected, whether searches were conducted by officers of the same sex and whether any written refusal of access was issued. Until those records or an official response emerge, the article should retain attribution to Georgievskaya rather than present the practice as an uncontested system-wide policy.

What happens next will show whether the measure is temporary, local or part of a wider change in detention security. Complaints by the bar, court challenges or inspection findings could provide independent evidence. The core issue is straightforward: reasonable security screening cannot become a discretionary mechanism for delaying or denying confidential contact between a detainee and chosen counsel.