MOSCOW, July 20 (RIA Novosti) - Russia’s Investigative Committee opened a criminal case concerning negligence committed in the course of processing adoption documents for the five-year-old boy who died in Italy, Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin said Sunday.
“The decision to bring criminal charges was made based on the results of a procedural check, in the course of which we received information about possible negligence on the part of government officials of the Amur Region, local self-government. [Negligence] occurred when the adoption documents were processed in 2012,” Markin said.
Markin added that investigation will assess actions of officials who denied custody to the boy’s relatives and processed requests of Russian families who wanted to adopt the kid.
Maximum sentence for criminal negligence is five years.
On Thursday, Italian media reported the death of a five-year-old boy from Blagoveshchensk, strangled by his adoptive father. Police of the Italian city of Pescara detained 47-year-old Italian citizen Massimo Maravalle.
The boy was adopted by an Italian couple in 2012. Italian media reported that adoptive father was on medication for his psychological problems. However, when the adoption was processed, this fact was omitted.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry and Russian Embassy in Rome are monitoring the situation.
