CCPR/C/122/D/2577/2015 the terms of his detention and the resulting conviction and additional sentence was merely a pretext to extend his original sentence, being both wildly disproportionate to his alleged infractions and the result of a hearing which violated his rights to a fair trial. The State party inaccurately claims that there have been no continuing violations of Mr. Formonov’s rights as a detainee to have access to his attorney or to be free from torture or abusive treatment. 5.2 The State party fails to address the allegations that Mr. Formonov was targeted in order to prevent him from carrying out his human rights activism and to restrict his freedom of expression, and that his detention was arbitrary as it was a response to his exercise of a fundamental right. The State party also fails to confront, or even deny, its documented practice of persecuting human rights defenders by imprisoning them on fabricated extortion charges, and does not acknowledge that the police seized human rights materials from Mr. Formonov’s home. 5.3 The author maintains that the evidence used was fabricated and that Mr. Formonov’s confession was obtained under torture. The chemical powder used to mark money for extortion was applied to Mr. Formonov by the police after he was in custody. 5.4 The fact that Mr. Formonov was, as the Government stated, arrested at the bus stop on Tashkent Street in Gulistan, having received from U.M. $250 and 200 thousand Sum through extortion is incorrect. This statement fails to explain the conflicting narrative set forth in the court’s decision, which variously describes Mr. Formonov having been caught “in flagrante delicto” as he received the money and as having been caught when the bribe money was recovered from inside his computer during a subsequent search of his apartment. 5.5 The search was performed without a valid warrant and with extraordinary brutality. Police attempted to search Mr. Formonov’s house twice without a warrant, then on their third attempt the officers presented an incomplete warrant, lacking the signature of an authorizing official or the seal of the Prosecutor’s Office. The officers beat the author, who was pregnant, so badly that she was knocked unconscious and required overnight hospitalization. 5.6 Although the State party states that police discovered unspecified “items connected with the conduct of the crime”, in fact the officers seized items connected with Mr. Formonov’s human rights work, namely, a computer and a photocopier used to produce human right pamphlets, and human rights literature, including pamphlets documenting torture and other human rights abuses of the authorities. Such documentation would have been irrelevant to a legitimate extortion charge. 5.7 The author challenges the State party’s assertion that Mr. Formonov was not placed in pretrial detention until 1 May 2006, and claims that Mr. Formonov was held incommunicado in pretrial detention for over a week, starting from his arrest on 29 April 2006. 5.8 Although the judgment references the testimony of seven witnesses, no witnesses were questioned in the presence of Mr. Formonov or his representative and there was no opportunity to examine any testimony. Mr. Formonov was represented by State-appointed counsels instead of his chosen representative, and it is unlikely that any evidence presented at trial would have been subjected to a rigorous cross-examination. The trial, during which all of the evidence was allegedly presented, lasted less than half an hour and comprised solely Judge K. reading the judgment and the sentence. Given the fabricated nature of evidence, the lack of cross-examination by him or his chosen representative and the briefness of the trial in which such evidence was to have been heard, the State party’s contention that Mr. Formonov’s guilt was proved by evidence is false. 5.9 The author notes that the appeals trial was not open to the public or to Mr. Formonov’s family, so it is not clear what occurred behind closed doors. Mr. Formonov’s family has been unable to obtain a copy of the appeals decision, despite a request to the regional court. Thus the State party cannot rely on an assertion that the appeals court appropriately examined and dismissed Mr. Formonov’s complaints if it keeps the records of such proceeding secret. 6