He went to the head of the village administration, the military commandant of the village, and the military commandant of Urus-Martan District. At 6 A.M. they drove to Urus-Martan to find his daughter. On the evening of March 27, 2000, they learned that Elza had been murdered. In Kungaev’s opinion, Budanov abducted Elza and then raped her because she was a pretty girl.
Witness A. S. Magamaev testified that he was a neighbor of the Kungaevs. They were a poor family. They worked mainly in the fields. He had known Elza since she was born. She was a shy girl and did not associate with boys her own age. He could say with certainty that Elza had never been a member of any armed formations.
The investigation has been unable to discover any evidence that E. V Kungaeva was associated with or a member of any IAF.
On the evening of March 26, 2000, the guardhouse duty squad was called out to an emergency. On the orders of the commanding officer of the regiment, the personnel of the guardhouse duty squad bound the commanding officer of the intelligence company. Bagreev, the commanding officer of the intelligence company, was lying on the ground. Budanov and Fedorov each kicked Bagreev at least three times. Everything happened very quickly. After this, Bagreev was put in a pit, the so-called Zindan.
After a time, when it was already dark, Makarshanov heard shouts and groans and came out of his tent. He saw that Budanov and Fedorov were in the pit where they had put Bagreev. (The tent was about 15-20 meters from the Zindan.) Fedorov was punching Bagreev in the face…. Somebody shone a torch into the pit, so he saw everything clearly. Someone then pulled Fedorov out of the pit.
Until 02.00 hours on March 27, Makarshanov was in Fedorov’s tent, keeping the stove lit. At about 01.00 hours he heard an APC drive up to Budanov’s quarters…. He saw four persons enter Budanov’s accommodation, one of whom was Budanov. One was carrying something on his shoulder, like a roll, its dimensions approximately those of a human body. He, Makarshanov, saw long hair hanging down from one end of the roll….
The person carrying the roll opened the doors, carried the roll inside, and put it on the floor. A light was burning in the accommodation. Accordingly, Makarshanov was able to see Budanov enter. The distance from the place where he was (in the tent) to Budanov’s quarters was some 8-10 meters…. The whole time after Budanov came to his quarters, he had three members of the crew of his APC standing by….
Witness Alexander Mikhailovich Saifullin testified that he had served with Army Unit 13 206 from August 1999. From late January 2000 his duties were to act as stoker in Budanov’s quarters. At approximately 05.00—05.15 hours on March 27, he entered the commander’s quarters…. Budanov was lying on the camp bed on the right and not, as usual, on the far one. The rug on the floor had been moved and was rumpled… and he saw that Budanov’s bed was not made up. Budanov was asleep. At about 7 A.M. he entered the quarters and poured the commander a bucket of water to wash himself…. The commander told him to tidy up in the quarters and, indicating the bed with his head, ordered him to change the blanket and all the bed linen. Saifullin set about tidying up and noticed that the blanket was damp…. Budanov gave him an hour to clean the premises from top to bottom. When he took the bed linen from the far camp bed out of Budanov’s quarters, the left corner of the sheet was wet.
Witness Valerii Vasilievich Gerasimov testified that from March 5 until April 20, 2000, he was acting commanding officer of the West Group of Troops. On the morning of March 27, he learned from the commandant of Urus-Martan that a girl had been abducted from Tangi during the night and that it was suspected that soldiers were responsible. He communicated with the commanding officers of three regiments, including Budanov of the 160th Tank Regiment, and ordered that the girl should be returned within 30 minutes. With General Alexander Ivanovich Verbitsky, he himself drove first to the 245th Regiment, then to the 160th Regiment.
In the 160th Regiment he was met personally by Budanov, who reported that everything was in order and that he had been unable to learn anything about the girl. Together with Verbitsky, [Gerasimov] drove to Tangi, where at that moment some villagers were gathered. From the explanation of the father of the girl, it appeared that a colonel had driven into the village during the night with soldiers in an APC, had wrapped the girl in a blanket, and carried her off. They knew this coloneclass="underline" he was the commanding officer of the tank regiment. At first [Gerasimov] and Verbitsky did not believe this. They returned to the regiment. Budanov was not to be found. Gerasimov ordered that Budanov should be detained.
There is a rule in the Russian armed forces that serving personnel can be arrested only with the permission of their superior officers. For Budanov, only General Gerasimov had this status. Accordingly, we are obliged to Gerasimov for the fact that there ever was a Budanov case. The majority of commanding officers in Chechnya do not give the prosecutor’s office permission to arrest those under their command who have committed war crimes and go to great lengths to protect them. Given the situation in the Zone of Antiterrorist Operations, Gerasimov’s act must be regarded as very courageous. It could well have cost him his career. Perhaps because the affair became a major focus of public attention, the general was not punished. Indeed, Gerasimov was appointed commander of the Fifty-eighth Army, a significant promotion. The indictment continues:
After his arrest, Budanov was taken to Hankala [the main military base in Chechnya]. On that same evening, the driver of the APC who had driven Budanov to the village admitted that on the night of March 27, they had brought a girl back and dragged her into Budanov’s quarters. Some two hours later, Budanov had summoned them. The girl was dead. Budanov had ordered them to take the body and bury it.
On the morning of March 28, the body was exhumed, taken to the Medical and Sanitary Battalion, medically examined, washed, and returned to the parents.
When interviewed as a witness, Igor Vladimirovich Grigoriev testified that on March 27, 2000, when they returned to the unit, Budanov ordered them to carry the girl, wrapped in a blanket, into his quarters and themselves to stand guard…. Budanov remained in his quarters with the girl. Some ten minutes after they had left the quarters, a woman’s cries were heard coming from within, and Budanov’s voice was also heard. Then music was heard coming from the accommodation. A woman’s screams were heard for some time more, coming from the same place.
Budanov was together with the girl in his quarters for between one and a half and two hours. Some two hours later, Budanov called all three of them into his quarters, where the woman they had brought was lying naked on the bed. Her face was a bluish color. The blanket they had wrapped the girl in was spread on the floor. Her clothing was lying on it in a heap. Budanov ordered them to take the woman away and bury her in secret…. Wrapping the body in the blanket, they drove the girl away in APC No. 391 and buried the body. Grigoriev reported this back to Budanov on the morning of March 27.
Interviewed on October 17, 2000, Grigoriev elaborated that ten to twenty minutes after their leaving Budanov’s quarters, Budanov began shouting. What, exactly, he did not hear. There were also several screams from the girl, screams indicative of fear. When, at Budanov’s summons, they entered his quarters, they saw the girl lying naked on the camp bed without signs of life…. The girl had bruises to her neck, as if she had been strangled. Pointing to her, Budanov said with a strange expression on his face, “That’s for you, you bitch, for Razmakhnin and the boys who died up that mountain.”