600 replies to this topic

[Helene]

My interpretation of what's said in the article is that he was going to call it off because it was getting late and Filin hadn't come out yet. Just as he was going to call it off, Filin appeared, and so, instead of calling it off, he told Zarutsky that Filin just came out of the theater and was probably going to drive home. So I don't see much contradiction.

I misunderstood -- I thought he meant he was calling to call off the attack altogether, not to give up for the night. That, too, contradicts the earlier statement attributed to him that when the beating didn't happen right away he forgot, and confirms one of the early reports that he confirmed when Filin was heading home.

If a fellow dancer witnessed the stakeout, even if had no idea what Dmitrichenko was planning, he would have overheard Dmitrichenko's end of the conversation and was a witness to his friend's plotting. It would also counter the assertions that there was no way Dmitrichenko could be involved. No wonder he was a reluctant witness and resigned.

[volcanohunter]

What makes no sense to me is Dmitrichenko taking his concerns about possible financial machinations to the theater management on January 16, and then going through with the attack on Filin the following day, rather than waiting to see whether anything would come of an internal investigation.

And if you're going to do a stakeout, why on earth bring along two witnesses? What sort of alibi could they provide?

"Where were you the night of January 17?"

"Parked outside the Moscow Art Theater."

That's not very helpful.

[Amy Reusch]

If Dmitrichenko thought he was given the brush-off... then frustration could be a motive. The stake-out sounds so poorly done indicating that it was possibly coincidence or just amateur, and surely Dmitrichenko was not a professional criminal. We really don't have enough information to know what is true. Dmitrichenko's lawyer leaving the interrogation is just ridiculous. What can we trust out of what we've heard?

[Drew]

If Dmitrichenko thought he was given the brush-off... then frustration could be a motive. The stake-out sounds so poorly done indicating that it was possibly coincidence or just amateur, and surely Dmitrichenko was not a professional criminal. We really don't have enough information to know what is true. Dmitrichenko's lawyer leaving the interrogation is just ridiculous. What can we trust out of what we've heard?

Amateur yes, but if the story is true then the stake-out can hardly be a "coincidence" since Dmitrichenko says he telephoned Zarutsky. Lucky chance of a criminal? In this story, he wasn't driving home, he was watching and deciding what to tell Zarutsky. Nor does he at all seem to be claiming this was a coincidence.

The fact that he includes the information that Annadurdyev was with him -- presumably not as an alibi but as a companion, if not a co-conspirator -- seems to suggest that the story is at least partly true, since it would have to be checked with someone who has no interest in confirming it but rather the contrary. That is, if Dmitrichenko is lying about the whole story because the confession was the result of coercion and stress, why invent a witness who could then be questioned and say it never happened or who might have his own alibi?

One can go off into less and less likely speculations: he just hates Annadurdyev or that he was purposely crafting a story full of impeachable details so it would have to fall apart in court? I have to say I think these are implausible explanations. Whereas he is an amateur in this kind of criminality...That said, a confession obtained in this way is unlikely to be the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

[Amy Reusch]

http://lifenews.ru/news/111507

I don't have time to translate the whole thing, but here is an excerpt that has to do with Mr. Annadurdyev.

On January 17 Dmitrichenko, together with dancer Batyr Annadurdyev and musician Alexander Yurasov, was going to go to his dacha in the Stupinsky district. In the afternoon he accidentally overheard at the theater that Sergey Filin was going to attend a gala at MHAT.

"We were sitting with Annadurdyev in a car in a parking lot and were watching some show, periodically re-parking in order to get a better Internet reception," said Dmitrichenko. "All this time I was watching Filin's car. Around 10:30pm I called Zarutsky to call everything off, but just at that moment I saw that Filin was approaching his car. And I told Zarutsky that he, most likely, was going home."

This is what I had mis-remembered as coincidence... that they happened to see Filin leaving as they were moving around for better wifi... so very very strange. And what does Yurasov say?

[solo]

A new turn in this story.

Moscow. 10 March /ITAR-TASS/. The Artistic Director of the Bolshoi Ballet company Sergei Filin may not come back to Russia if the assault case is not seen through to the end. This was announced today by Filin’s friend Grigoryi Belkin in his interview to the ‘News of the Week’ programme on Russia-1 Channel.
‘I am afraid that if this case of assault (attempt) on Sergei is not seen through to the end after all and consequently his safety in Russia is not secured, he might not come back’, Belkin said. ‘He is receiving a huge number of offers from abroad, from the world’s top theatres.’
http://spb.itar-tass...322/671691.html

[Mme. Hermine]

_{A lengthy New Yorker article by David Remnick:
http://www.newyorker...fa.fact_remnick}

Sometimes an institution has an uncanny way of embodying the society to which it belongs. For decades, the office of the heavyweight championship of the world—and the battles for that crown, from Jack Johnson to Mike Tyson—said something about the racial dynamics of twentieth-century America. So it is at the pinnacles of Russian dance. Since the nineteenth century, the country’s two principal stages—the Mariinsky, in St. Petersburg, and the Bolshoi, in Moscow—have acted as microcosms of imperial Russia, Soviet Russia, and, now, Vladimir Putin’s Russia.
_{In the days I spent talking with dancers, instructors, and administrators at the Bolshoi, it was clear that everyone had accepted some version of this theme: “What happens in the theatre reflects what is happening in the streets.}

”

[volcanohunter]

Katerina Novikova, in her role as Bolshoi press secretary states:

No one doubts the guilt of Dmitrichenko, he is involved in this terrible crime and ought to be held accountable. But it appears that he was not alone, and that someone else is standing behind him.

http://ria.ru/cultur...l#ixzz2NFMxTtEI

(Sorry for the lumbering translation.)

On the other hand, another outlet publishes an interview with a Bolshoi dancer, who asked not to be named because the Bolshoi had advised dancers not to talk to the press about a meeting that took place between Bolshoi employees and police investigators, in which he lays out their doubts about Dmitrichenko's guilt.

The meeting left us with an unpleasant aftertaste. Everyone knew and loved the guy, and no one believes that he is capable of such a thing. They doubt the facts being presented. And the troupe is especially troubled that he was arrested practically without any proof of his guilt. Because the only proof came after, his personal confession, after he was interrogated at night, after 48 hours of detention, not having been fed once, as far as we can tell from the information reaching us. And what happened there, what forced him to confess is unknown.

http://www.mk.ru/cul...-na-filina.html

Given that there have been quite a few articles in the Russian press along the lines of "people within the Bolshoi do not believe in Dmitrichenko's guilt," Novikova's attempt at message control and presenting a unified front seems clumsy.

[abatt]

Why is it clumsy? She is the official spokesperson for the Bolshoi on this matter. She is stating the official position of the organization. If other employees want to leak their own opinions to the press, it is not relevant to the official position of the institution.

[volcanohunter]

I think it's clumsy because she explicitly states that "no one doubts," when it appears that, for the moment at least, there are plenty of doubters.

[sandik]

I think it's clumsy because she explicitly states that "no one doubts," when it appears that, for the moment at least, there are plenty of doubters.

That is the difference between a spokesperson for a particular organization, and a reporter.

[volcanohunter]

I should have phrased my observation differently, because what matters is not my perception, but whether her attempt at message control is likely to be effective. Whatever you think of Novikova's statement, this is a response on the blog of Kirill Filatov, one of the leaders of the Bolshoi's second violin section:

Today the RIA Novosti agency published a statement by Bolshoi Theater press secretary Katerina Novikova regarding the situation around Pavel Dmitrichenko. In connection with this, I, Kirill Filatov, today, 11 March 2013, being of sound mind and firm memory, consider it necessary officially to declare the following:

I had, have and will have no connection to the "collective" and "no one doubts" mentioned in the interview. The honorable Ms. Novikova CANNOT say anything of the sort in my name inasmuch as I hold the opposite view on this point.

I also consider it necessary to add that I, being more than usually sociable, communicate with a large portion of the artistic, administrative and technical staff. I can assure you that among those with whom I have shared opinions on this situation, those who definitely believe that Pavel Dmitrichenko is party to the attack on Sergei Filin are only a handful, a far greater portion at minimum simply doubt his participation, and an even greater number completely reject the possibility of his guilt.

Yes, we may all be mistaken, however the assertion that the entire troupe supposedly does not have doubts about the guilt of Pavel Dmitrichenko is a lie.

http://filatovkirill...com/293163.html

[dirac]

I think it's clumsy because she explicitly states that "no one doubts," when it appears that, for the moment at least, there are plenty of doubters.

That is the difference between a spokesperson for a particular organization, and a reporter.

Still pretty klutzy, I'd say, even considering the source. In general whenever a flack says "No one doubts" or uses similar language in a situation like this one where much is still unknown and unclear, it only serves to highlight the fact that doubters are thick on the ground.

[Catherine]

I have been given to understand that as a result of decades of government censorship, Russians are better at reading between the lines than we in the West are...

Indeed.

Everyone is focusing on the leaves here. There is a glaringly obvious oversight that everyone is tiptoeing around, in the press, inside the Bolshoi, and for good reason: fear. What Amy wrote above is the closest to the truth yet. Read between the lines. The answer is in front of your nose. People know who it is. People are not stating that outright bc the person in question wields so much power. Think.

There's such a thing as a pawn. The hired gun who hired another gun, who hired a third gun. The man who takes the blame. The story is as old as history.

In my view, what Dmitrichenko said/did/planned, at this point is irrelevant if the impetus was not coming from him. And that is the message that the Bolshoi press, Filin, his attorney, and numerous articles have been telling us for over a month now: Dmitrichenko was not the initial source of this. Think/look at the forest, not the leaves. It is right in front of us in every article they print.

Dancers at the Bolshoi were supposed to hold a collective meeting on Saturday about the issue -i have not had time yet to follow up and find out if that took place but I presume it did not as I've heard nothing since on that note.

[Drew]

Indeed.
There's such a thing as a pawn. The hired gun who hired another gun, who hired a third gun. The man who takes the blame. The story is as old as history.

In my view, what Dmitrichenko said/did/planned, at this point is irrelevant if the impetus was not coming from him. And that is the message that the Bolshoi press, Filin, his attorney, and numerous articles have been telling us for over a month now: Dmitrichenko was not the initial source of this. Think/look at the forest, not the leaves. It is right in front of us in every article they print.
.

Dmitrichenko may well be a pawn--but what he actually did is not altogether irrelevant, especially when dancers are refusing to believe he was involved at all. His arrest did not occur, as one of them is quoted as saying, with no evidence whatsoever--there was evidence having to do with cell phone purchases, usage etc.: the kind of evidence that police departments all over the world use all the time. It's also not irrelevant in determining to what degree he is being "victimized" and to what degree he should shoulder his own share of responsibility however secondary. (Put a little differently: a pawn in this situation is not quite the same as a victim.)

That said, it's obviously crucial for the future of the theater that all the persons involved, especially those most powerful who are "behind" this crime, be exposed and, one hopes, tried for their crimes. I confess, though, that the answer is not obvious to me. I would be curious what you are thinking and why.