Ukrainian authorities officially charged a Russian prison doctor and an inmate accomplice with war crimes on Friday, detailing a campaign of systematic torture, sexual violence, and medical abuse against Ukrainian prisoners of war and abducted civilians.
The Security Service of Ukraine issued formal notices of suspicion following an investigation published Thursday by reporting partners that exposed widespread abuse at Correctional Colony No. 7 in Russia’s Vladimir region.
Reporters shared their findings with Ukrainian law enforcement, helping identify the perpetrators. The investigation drew on interviews with approximately 50 former captives who returned from the colony between 2024 and May 2026. Multiple survivors identified the prison doctor, known to inmates by the nickname “The Quack,” as 48-year-old Vyacheslav Cherdantsev.
Former inmates told investigators that Cherdantsev denied sick prisoners medication, subjected them to forced nudity and degrading examinations, and coerced them into simulating sexual acts for the amusement of guards. One prisoner, 23-year-old Marine Pavlo Polovyi, died by suicide after being denied medical treatment.
The SBU documents formally charge Cherdantsev, an employee of the Federal Penitentiary Service, along with his enforcer, 29-year-old Russian inmate Yaroslav Kirillov. Both are charged under Article 438 of the Ukrainian Criminal Code for the cruel treatment of prisoners of war and civilians.
According to the SBU, Cherdantsev weaponized his medical position to break the will of Ukrainian captives, attempting to coerce them into accepting Russian citizenship and providing false confessions to justify Russia’s invasion.
The charging documents outline a litany of alleged atrocities committed between 2022 and 2025. Rather than providing care, Cherdantsev allegedly beat prisoners who visited the medical unit or ordered guards and inmates to do so. In one instance, he allegedly ripped off a prisoner’s toenail with forceps without anesthesia.
The SBU alleges that when a scabies epidemic broke out, the doctor and prison administration intentionally placed infected inmates into crowded cells with healthy prisoners to spread the disease. As punishment, Cherdantsev allegedly stripped sick prisoners of all clothing and belongings for up to six weeks, forcing them to stand in freezing temperatures and take ice-cold showers.
The documents also detail horrific sexual violence. In mid-2023, Cherdantsev and Kirillov allegedly cornered a Ukrainian POW in the prison library. After the prisoner refused the doctor’s demands, the two men severely beat him and sexually assaulted him using a broken chair leg. Kirillov later brought another inmate into the cell and ordered him to rape the Ukrainian POW.
In other instances, Cherdantsev allegedly used brilliant green antiseptic dye to paint genitalia and obscene inscriptions on the bodies and faces of sick prisoners.
The accused doctor previously worked as a paramedic in a juvenile colony in Kyrgyzstan before moving to Russia in 2013. He began working at IK-7 in 2015.
The SBU asserts that the abuse was part of a highly organized, repressive system sanctioned by the colony’s leadership. Deputy Security Chief O.V. Khavetskyi and operative G.R. Shvetsov are named as co-conspirators who allegedly gave subordinates permission to torture Ukrainian captives as long as no visible marks were left.