Perinatal epicenter: Novokuznetsk maternity hospital management faces up to seven years

The preventive measure for the leadership of Novokuznetsk hospital No. 1 will be chosen on Thursday, January 15, according to the Central District Court of the city. On January 13, law enforcement agencies detained the chief physician Vitaly Heraskov and the head of the intensive care unit Alexei Emikh in a criminal case of negligence and causing death by negligence — nine babies died in the hospital during the New Year holidays. Lawyers interviewed by Izvestia believe that the management of the medical institution faces up to seven years in prison, but rather under the article on negligence. After all, to accuse a person of causing death by negligence, he must be either an attending physician or an operating surgeon and make a certain mistake. What is the judicial practice in such cases? — in our material.

What are the doctors of Novokuznetsk hospital charged with?

The Central District Court of Novokuznetsk has scheduled a hearing for Thursday, January 15, at which a preventive measure will be chosen for two doctors of Novokuznetsk City Clinical Hospital No. 1. We are talking about the head physician Vitaly Heraskov and the head of the intensive care unit Alexei Emikha. The official representative of the Investigative Committee, Svetlana Petrenko, announced their detention on January 13. Doctors are suspected of negligence and causing death by negligence.

"According to the investigation, from January 4 to January 12, 2026, nine newborns who were born from December 1, 2025 to January 12, 2026 died as a result of improper performance by the suspects of their official and professional duties in organizing and providing medical care at Novokuznetsk Maternity Hospital No. 1," Petrenko said.

Doctors can face up to four years in prison for causing death by negligence, and up to seven years for negligence. Irina Gritsenko, a lawyer in the field of medical law, in an interview with Izvestia, expressed the opinion that, most likely, only an article about negligence could remain in the final charge.

— To accuse a person of causing death by negligence, he must be either an attending physician or an operating surgeon and make a certain mistake. The classic situation is that a surgeon damages a vein during an operation, and the patient dies from blood loss," the lawyer explained. — Negligence is when a person has administrative or administrative functions: distributes finances, hires employees, and specifies how many drugs to purchase.

An official who can be accused of negligence is also usually involved in compliance with sanitary standards, the lawyer explained. In the case of Novokuznetsk, when an infection is detected, it is such a person who has the authority to close the maternity hospital for "moika" — large-scale disinfection.

— If we are talking about causing death by negligence, then the absence of intent is important, otherwise it will be murder. In case of negligence, an official realizes that he is doing the wrong thing, but he continues to do it anyway," said Irina Hrytsenko.

Negligence is considered a premeditated crime, which is serious, therefore, the term under this article is longer. Causing death by negligence is a lighter crime, it needs to be investigated within a year, the expert explained. It is impossible to do all the necessary expertise in a short time to impute such an article.

In addition, the death of children can be considered a continuing episode of a crime, or they can be divided into several episodes. In the case of a prolonged episode, most often, the punishment is minimal, Irina Hrytsenko clarified.

Aggravating and mitigating factors

If the newborn initially had a severe pathology or an intrauterine infection, then this cannot be a mitigating circumstance in the doctor's case, Albert Khaleyan, a criminal lawyer and partner at the Vector Prime Moscow Bar Association, told Izvestia.

"Such circumstances are the basic condition for a doctor's work," he explained. — The court will assess whether the actions of the doctors were adequate to this serious condition, whether they did everything possible according to the standards or, conversely, aggravated the situation with negligence. If a child was born "heavy", this is not an excuse for inaction.

An examination will have to prove a direct link between the deaths of children with pathologies and the actions of doctors, Irina Hrytsenko noted. If there is no such connection, then there will be no criminal prosecution of doctors. In this case, the victims can apply to a civil court with a claim for compensation for moral damage.

Veronika Polyakova, a criminal defense lawyer and managing partner of the Business Legal Group Bar Association, agreed with her. She also admitted that the medical staff of the maternity hospital, who provided medical care to women in labor and newborns, may also be involved in the case.

Not all cases go to court

In 2016, investigators began adding Article 238 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation to medical cases — "Production, storage, transportation or sale of goods and products, performance of work or provision of services that do not meet safety requirements," Irina Gritsenko said. According to her, the examinations were carried out for a long time, the investigators did not have time to meet the deadlines set by law, so they added an article so as not to stop the investigation: so they could take longer to deal with the case.

The professional community regarded the incident as a mistake and began to seek regulation. At the end of 2024, a law was passed according to which doctors could not be held accountable under article 238.

But, according to Irina Gritsenko, this decision does not decriminalize medical practice, since there are at least two more articles: 109th - "Causing death by negligence" and 118th — "Causing serious harm to health by negligence."

"Both the lawyers and the investigators understood that the charges would not go away, there would simply be other articles, and the method of proof was the same," Irina Hrytsenko noted.

Doctors are regularly accused of crimes, but not all cases go to court. Thus, according to the Investigative Committee, in January-September 2025, 2,316 patients and their relatives reported crimes in connection with the provision of medical care, but during the same period, only 162 criminal cases were sent to court.

One of the most high—profile and long-running cases, in which an end was reached in 2025, was the case of medical negligence that led to the deaths of eight patients in St. Petersburg. From July 2021 to January 2022, doctors used barium sulfate, which was not pharmaceutical grade, for stomach X-rays. A total of 52 people were injured. The criminal case against the former chief physician of the institution and his deputy has been separated into separate proceedings and suspended due to his service in the special military operation zone. Deputy chief physician Alexandra Feofanova was sentenced to 4 years and 5 months in prison, the head of the radiation diagnostics department, and radiologist Elena Medvedeva was sentenced to five years.

Another high-profile case was the story of Kaliningrad doctors. In 2018, at the 24th week of pregnancy, a woman gave birth to a boy who weighed only 700 grams. According to the investigation materials, Elena Belaya, the acting chief physician of maternity hospital No. 4 in the Kaliningrad region, instructed anaesthetist and intensive care specialist Elina Sushkevich to administer a lethal dose of magnesium sulfate to the infant in order to simulate his intrauterine death and not spoil the statistics of the maternity hospital on infant mortality. In addition, Belaya demanded that other employees correct the child's medical history.

At first, the doctors were acquitted, as it was not possible to prove the fact of the drug administration. However, in 2022, during the appeal, they were convicted. The new court did not overturn the decision in 2025, as a result of which Elena Belaya was sentenced to 9.5 years in a penal colony, and Elina Sushkevich to nine. But they were charged with much more serious articles than negligence, about organizing a murder and murder.

In January 2026, a criminal case was opened in Simferopol over the death of a newborn in a maternity hospital. The woman in labor claims that she was hospitalized in the perinatal center when her water broke. However, the child was not born, and the mother began to feel unwell. She had an emergency caesarean section 41 hours later. Two days after birth, the boy died due to sepsis. The mother believes that she has developed inflammation due to a long waterless period, before that, the tests did not indicate a threat.