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Moscow airport police chief put in 2-month pre-trial custody

MOSCOW, January 23. /ITAR-TASS/. A court in Moscow sanctioned on Thursday a two-month pre-trial custody term for police chief of Domodedovo airport Maxim Titov, who was detained earlier in the week on charges of abuse of power.

A motion to sanction the custody term was submitted with the Presnensky Court of Moscow by investigators, who claim that if released Titov may exert pressure on witnesses in the case or destroy evidence.

The court also waved away request of Titov’s lawyers asking the judge to release their client either on bail or place him under house arrest.

Titov denies charges and said the case was instigated by one of his former subordinates for reasons of his personal revenge.

“I am ready to cooperate with the investigation, always appeared when I was summoned up for questioning and I do not understand why I should be placed in custody,” he told the court.

Investigators claim that in April of 2012 Titov and several of his subordinates illegally detained five people and beat them up. One of them suffered moderate bodily harm.

Last year Russian police was in the center of a number of scandals connected with the abuse of authority. In 2011, Russia conducted a broad police reform upon order from then-President Dmitry Medvedev. The reform was held through a number of re-evaluation tests aimed to expose corrupt and incompetent officers and resulted in a cut of police force from 1.2 million to one million.