MOSCOW, November 23. /TASS/. Moscow’s Basmanny Court has placed Head of the Interior Ministry Department for the Kizlyar District of Dagestan Police Colonel Gazi Isayev into custody in the 2010 Moscow subway terror attack criminal case, the court’s press office told TASS on Monday.

"The investigator’s request has been granted. Custody until January 4, 2021 has been chosen for Isayev," the press office said.

As part of the criminal probe into the terror attacks carried out at the Lubyanka and Park Kultury (Park of Culture) stations of the Moscow subway, the Investigative Committee’s Main Investigation Department jointly with the Federal Security Service of Russia has detained Chief of the Russian Interior Ministry Department for the Kizlyar District, Police Colonel Gazi Isayev. He is charged with committing crimes stipulated by Part 3 of Article 210, Part 3 of Article 209 and Part 3 of Article 205 of Russia’s Criminal Code (participation in a criminal community, banditry and a terror act), Investigative Committee Spokeswoman Svetlana Petrenko said earlier on Monday.

As the investigators say, Isayev was a member of the Imarat Kavkaz criminal community (outlawed in Russia). In 2009-2010, using his official position, he provided information to the ringleaders of the criminal community on the activity of the Kizlyar District Interior Department and on special operations against illegal armed formations.

Also, he repeatedly personally transported the ringleaders of the criminal community’s structural units across the territory of the Republic of Dagestan and personally delivered a female suicide bomber with an explosive fastened to her to the bus terminal in the area of Kizlyar in his car for her to depart for Moscow for committing a terror attack.

Pleading not guilty

Isayev pleads not guilty in the Moscow subway terror attack criminal case, his lawyer Eldar Khastinov told TASS on Monday. "He pleads not guilty and considers his prosecution as a revenge for his professional activity. We will appeal against the court’s decision on placing Isayev into custody," the lawyer said.

According to the lawyer, the criminal case against the head of the Kizlyar District police is based on the testimony of those whom he had helped bring to account for terrorism himself.

The Moscow subway terror attacks carried out on March 29, 2010 claimed the lives of 39 people while over 100 others were injured.