MOSCOW, December 18 - RAPSI, Diana Gutsul. An expert stated on Tuesday in the Tverskoy District Court that Sergei Magnitsky did not sign the consent form to be taken to the Matrosskaya Tishina detention ward for treatment where he later died.

The hearings were held on Tuesday into the criminal case against Dmitry Kratov, who earlier served as the deputy head of the Butyrka isolation ward. He has been accused of improperly executing his authorities, which resulted in Magnitsky's death.

"The signature (on the consent form) was not made by Magnitsky," the expert said. Neither court party had any questions to him.

The court will continue hearing the case on Wednesday. Judge Tatyana Neverova has asked the prosecutors to summon their witnesses.

If no witnesses appear, the court will move to the interrogation of the witnesses for the defense, she said. Magnitsky, who served as a managing partner of the Firestone Duncan auditing firm and a legal consultant of the Hermitage Capital Management investment fund, was detained on November 24, 2008.

On the same day, the Investigative Committee charged him with tax evasion as part of a criminal case against Hermitage Capital Management. On November 26, the Tverskoy District Court issued an arrest warrant in his name. On November 16, 2009, he died in the Matrosskaya Tishina investigative isolation ward where he had been held for almost a year.

His death incited a public uproar. Apart from Kratov, the ward's doctor Larisa Litvinova was also a defendant in the case. However, the Investigative Committee closed the case against her last spring due to amendments to the Criminal Code affecting the statute of limitations.