MOSCOW, February 18 - RAPSI, Diana Gutsul. The Tverskoy District Court of Moscow will hear the case against Hermitage Capital auditor Sergei Magnitsky, who was charged with tax avoidance and died in pretrial detention in 2009, on March 4, 2013, the court told RAPSI.

On Monday the court held the third pretrial hearing of the case behind closed doors, as specified by the law.

The trial of Hermitage Capital Management CEO Bill Browder, also on charges of tax evasion, is being held in absentia, because the UK has refused to cooperate with Russia over the case.

Since Magnitsky and Browder's lawyers did not attend the court hearings, the court appointed new lawyers to the defendants during the previous pretrial hearing.
Magnitsky's mother sent the court a letter through her representative, writing that neither she, nor any other of her son's relatives, had requested the police to reopen her son's case.

She states that she has not empowered anyone to represent Sergei Magnitsky, and that anyone who assumes these powers "will be acting contrary to his [Magnitsky's] interests."

Sergei Magnitsky, an auditor of the London-based Hermitage Capital investment fund, was arrested on November 24, 2008 on suspicion of masterminding large-scale corporate tax evasion. He died in a Moscow pretrial detention center on November 16, 2009, after spending a year behind bars.
According to the Prosecutor General's Office, Magnitsky died of cardiovascular insufficiency.

Magnitsky's death evoked an international public outcry, triggered amendments to the Criminal Code and a reshuffling of officials in the penal system.

Dmitry Kratov, former deputy head of the Butyrka pretrial detention center, and the ward's doctor, Larisa Litvinova, were defendants in the case of Magnitsky's death. In December 2012, the court has acquitted Kratov of negligence which resulted in Sergei Magnitsky's death. The case against Litvinova was closed in spring 2012 following amendments to the Criminal Code affecting the statute of limitations.

According to investigators, Magnitsky and his accomplices embezzled hundreds of millions of rubles from the budget by manipulating tax returns between September and October 2007.

For its part, Hermitage Capital maintains that it paid 5.4 billion rubles (around $180 million) in taxes, but that the money was stolen by corporate raiders with the help of law enforcement officials.

Magnitsky's prosecution has been attributed to this theft. The case was closed after his death, only to be reopened later. Under Russian criminal law, it is possible to prosecute a person after their death.

In May 2012, the Moscow City Court rejected an application filed by Magnitsky's relatives who demanded to have the criminal case against him closed.