September 27, 2001

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In the Zavodskoy district of Grozny, three Russian military men stopped a young man and began to insult him. But he managed to snatch the machine gun from the hands of one of them. The military changed their tone and began asking for the return of the weapons. Realizing that he would then deprive himself of protection, the local resident did not agree and began to leave. Pointing guns at each other, backing away and talking, they approached a mini-market near the former boarding school No. 1. The women trading there found out what had happened and begged the young man to give up the machine gun. They also helped him escape.

Having received the weapons back, the military climbed onto an armored personnel carrier that had arrived and drove off towards the military unit located on a nearby hill. After some time, the area around the mini-market, including residential areas, came under artillery fire from there.

***
At about 7 o'clock, eight masked Russian law enforcement officers burst into the apartment located in the Staropromyslovsky district of Grozny at the address: Mayakovskogo town, 74-70. At this time, Anatoly Kulvinets, his three-year-old nephew and mother Nadezhda Vladimirovna Proshina were in the apartment. Before their eyes, the security forces began turning over furniture and belongings and, not finding anything in them, demanded that the owner hand over the weapon. But he said that he never had one.

Having failed to obtain the necessary answer from Anatoly Kulvinets, law enforcement officers handcuffed him and took him away. They did not tell his mother where he would be taken. But they didn’t forget to take family photo albums with them, putting them in a travel bag taken from the apartment.

Nadezhda Proshina began searching for her son. First, she contacted the Staropromyslovsky District VOVD, the local military commandant’s office, the RUBOP and the FSB, receiving everywhere the same standard answer - “we don’t have your son.” Then the elderly woman went around to all the nearby military units: the result was the same. Already in despair, on October 6 she came to the RUBOP again. This time the department employees did not deny anything; they reported that her son, Anatoly Kulvinets, was indeed with them. He was allegedly detained on suspicion of murdering two women who lived in the neighborhood and a criminal case was opened against him under Article 105 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. She was advised to contact the prosecutor's office about this.

However, on September 29, Nadezhda Proshina already went there and filed an application to search for her son. Then they promised to answer her within 10 days. She received no answer.

On October 7, in the town of Mayakovsky, four cars drove up to the house where the detainee lived with his mother. Military and local policemen emerged from them. They pulled Anatoly Kulvinets out of the car. A mask was pulled over his head and his hands were handcuffed.

According to eyewitnesses, law enforcement officers took him to a neighboring entrance, where the murder had once been committed. There, apparently, it was planned to conduct an investigative experiment. The detainee had to show how he “committed” the crime. The victims also went up there with them: the husband and son of the murdered women. Neighbors told Nadezhda Proshina that they had brought her son and that he might be beaten (screams could be heard from the neighboring entrance). She rushed there and saw how they dragged her son out into the street and tried to put him in the car. His mother tried to intercede for him, but she was rudely insulted and thrown back.

Neighbors and acquaintances of Anatoly Kulvinets unanimously asserted that he was not involved in this murder. However, no one wanted to listen to them; the investigation was not interested in the opinions of these people. Nadezhda Proshina turned to V. Kalamanov’s bureau and the Memorial Human Rights Center for help.

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Unknown armed people (up to eight people) attacked the building of the pension department in the village of Michurina. Two police officers were killed: Tahir Vakhidovich Sambiev and Lorsa Lechievich Puchaev. Both of them were natives of the village of Starye Atagi. Sergeant Major Eskanov and two other local residents were wounded.

***
At 10 p.m., the private television company “TV-10 Avtury,” broadcast from the village of Avtury, Shalinsky district, unexpectedly showed a videotape from a meeting held by the field commanders of the VF of the ChRI Shamil Basayev and Khattab. Together with their subordinates, they planned to carry out some kind of operation, and then made an appeal to local residents. The second tape, which was also aired, recorded Russian military torture of detained Chechens. In particular, they showed footage of sawing up a living person with a chainsaw, burning another, how they mock corpses, etc.
The next morning it turned out that the head of the TV channel, Akhmed Madayev, was taken from his workplace by unknown masked people before showing the videotapes. On the same day, investigators from the Shali Prosecutor's Office arrived in the village. They inspected the scene and testified to the fact that the studio had indeed been attacked, during which three cars were burned and valuable equipment was broken. Workers from the prosecutor's office interviewed Akhmed Madayev's brother and went back to the regional center.

From the book “People Live Here”, Usam Baysaev, Dmitry Grushkin, 2006.