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US Border Service checked Lesin leaving country to close visa

The official representative of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Michael Friel told that it is a standard procedure in similar cases

Mikhail Lesin EPA/SERGEI ILNTSKY, archive

Mikhail Lesin

© EPA/SERGEI ILNTSKY, archive

WASHINGTON, March 13. /TASS/. The record of a departure appeared in the passport of the late Russia’s former mass media minister and ex-CEO of Gazprom-Media Mikhail Lesin on December 15, i.e. after his death. The official representative of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Michael Friel told TASS it was done only to close the issued visa.

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"The record in the database of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection has been made to close the non-immigrant visa of the deceased," Friel said. This record does not indicate a real departure from the United States on commercial or private aircraft. According to Friel, this is a standard procedure in similar cases.

Lesin died on November 6, 2016 at the Dupont Circle in the center of the US capital at the age of 57. The police found nothing suspicious at the scene then. The former minister’s friends in Moscow said that he was ill in recent years, underwent several operations, and, according to preliminary data, the cause of his death was a heart attack.

In early March the police and medical examiner office of Washington DC said that the death of Mikhail Lesin in the US capital last November was caused by blunt force trauma to the head.

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Mikhail Lesin also had blunt force injuries to the neck, torso, arms and legs, Washington DC's chief medical examiner said after a post-mortem. The 57-year-old was found at the city's Dupont Circle hotel.

In a joint statement, the District of Colombia Office of Medical Examiner and Metropolitan Police Department said: "The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner (OCME) has released the cause and manner of death for Mikhail Lesin, 59, Russia. Cause of Death: blunt force injuries of the head," the statement said. "Other contributing causes: blunt force injuries of the neck, torso, upper extremities and lower extremities. Manner of death: undetermined." The incident remains under active investigation, the statement added,

After his death, his family members were quoted by Russian media as saying that he had a heart attack. The chief medical examiner provided no further details.

Meanwhile, police spokesman Dustin Sternbeck said the case remained under investigation, the Washington Post reported. He declined to say whether the post-mortem results meant a crime may have been committed.

Lesin held the post of Russia’s Minister for the Press, TV and Radio Broadcasting and Mass Communications between July 1999 and February 2004. In 2013-2014 he was the CEO and Chairman of the Board of Gazprom-Media Holding.

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