[1] His arrest in 2008 and subsequent death after eleven months in police custody generated international attention and triggered both official and unofficial inquiries into allegations of fraud, theft and human rights violations in Russia.

In early January 2013, the Financial Times wrote that "the Magnitsky case is egregious, well documented and encapsulates the darker side of Putinism".

[13] Over the years of its operation Hermitage had, on several occasions, supplied to the press information about corporate and governmental misconduct and corruption in state-owned Russian enterprises.

[9] Browder has said that he represented a threat only "to corrupt politicians and bureaucrats" in Russia, and believed that he was removed to leave his company open for exploitation.

[17] In October 2007, Browder received word that one of the firms maintained in Moscow had a trial against it for an alleged unpaid debt of hundreds of millions of dollars.

According to Ludmila Alekseeva, leader of the Moscow Helsinki Group, Magnitsky had died from being beaten and tortured by several officers of the Russian Ministry of Interior.

[23]An independent investigatory body, the Moscow Public Oversight Commission, indicated in December 2009 that "psychological and physical pressure was exerted upon" Magnitsky.

[20] In December 2009, in two separate decrees, Medvedev fired Alexander Piskunov, deputy head of the Federal Penitentiary Service, and signed a law forbidding the jailing of individuals who are suspected of tax crimes.

[26] Magnitsky's death is also believed to be linked to the firing of Major-General Anatoli Mikhalkin, formerly the head of the Moscow division of the tax crimes department of the Interior Ministry.

Opalesque TV released a video on 8 February 2010, in which Hermitage Capital Management founder Bill Browder revealed details of Sergei Magnitsky's ordeal during his 11 months in detention.

[28] On 25 June 2010 radio-station Echo of Moscow announced that Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs Department for Own Security started investigations against Lieutenant Colonel Artyom Kuznetsov, who has been accused of improper imprisonment of Magnitsky.

"[9] A film produced to highlight Magnitsky's persecution has been shown to the American Congress and British, Canadian, German, Polish, and European parliaments.

[9] In July 2011, Russia's Investigate Committee initially acknowledged that Magnitsky died because prison authorities restricted medical care for him.

[30] Russian authorities also opened criminal cases against the two doctors who treated him; Dr. Dmitri Kratov, the chief medical officer at Butyrskaya Prison, and Dr. Larisa Litvinova, who managed Magnitsky's treatment towards the end.

[33] On 28 December 2012, a Tverskoy court found Kratov not guilty of negligence causing Magnitsky's death,[34] thus complying with the prosecution's request.

[35] In 2012 Pavel Karpov, former Russian Interior Ministry officer accused by Magnitsky and Browder of being the main beneficiary of the tax fraud, filed a libel suit in London.

[36] In February 2012, the Russian police announced their intention to resubmit charges of tax evasion against Magnitsky for a second[clarification needed] trial.

The court also found Browder, Magnitsky's onetime client and a US-born British investor, guilty of evading some $17 million in taxes.

These included information on at least 23 companies linked to an alleged $230 million tax fraud in Russia, a case that was being investigated by Sergei Magnitsky.

The ICIJ investigation also revealed that the husband of one of the Russian tax officials deposited millions in a Swiss bank account set up by one of the offshore companies.

[41] Since worsening of relations with the European Union after 2014, the version officially promoted in Russia is that Bill Browder's Hermitage Capital was responsible for tax fraud and that Magnitsky died as a result of his conspiracy involving Alexey Navalny, which was highlighted in a 2016 "investigative" film by Andrei Nekrasov.

[citation needed] The EU Parliament also urged members to freeze assets of officials, while similar measures were under consideration in the United States.

McCain said the law would help to "identify those responsible for the death of this Russian patriot, to make their names famous for the whole world to know, and then to hold them accountable for their crimes.

[48] The Russian Foreign Ministry described the Canadian resolution as "an attempt to pressure the investigators and interfere in the internal affairs of another state",[49] while in a November statement the head of the lower house's international committee Konstantin Kosachyov criticized the European Parliament's conclusions, indicating that sanctions violated the "presumption of innocence" principle and should await the resolution of the Russian court.

[citation needed] Bloomberg reported in December that, according to an Interfax story, "identical measures" would be taken by Russia if a European Union ban was put into place.

[50] In January 2011, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture, Juan E. Méndez, opened an investigation into Magnitsky's treatment and death.

[51] In November 2011 a permanent exhibition with the title "Sergei Magnitsky – witness for justice and democracy in Russia" was opened in the Checkpoint Charlie Museum in Berlin.