"A survey in connection
with the theft at the Hotel Adler is completed, there is no claim
against those questioned," police said in a prepared statement.
Earlier in the day, band
members Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova were meeting with
journalists when police detained them, according to Tolokonnikova's
husband, Petr Verzilov. Russian media corroborated the report.
"They were put to the
floor and beaten and physical force was used to them when they refused
to be questioned without the presence of their lawyer, who was on his
way to the police department," Verzilov told reporters.
"Unbelievable
lawlessness, even we are amazed," tweeted Tolokonnikova. "Beat on the
floor of the department, in the Olympic capital!"
Invoking the name of
Russian President Vladimir Putin, she added, "They dragged me on the
floor in the hall of the department, hands tied behind back and thrown
to the floor. Putin will teach you to love the motherland!"
She said they would file a complaint with the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation.
The two women had been
walking down a street accompanied by the journalists, three other
members of Pussy Riot who use pseudonyms, and two local activists, when a
group of about 10 plainclothes police approached them and asked for
their identification, said "Tank," one of the anonymous bandmates.
The police said they
suspected Tolokonnikova may have had something to do with a theft in the
hotel where the band members were staying, Tank said.
The officers then took away the band members, activists and journalists for questioning.
Tolokonnikova, Alyokhina
and Tank tweeted the news about their detention from their cell phones,
with Tolokonnikova posting photos of what she said was the vehicle that
was taking her to a police station.
In a separate tweet,
Alyokhina said they had been forced into a police van after being
stopped near the Church of Mikhail the Archangel and accused of
committing a crime.
Tank called CNN from the police station, complaining about having to wait there with no information from police.
They were not put in handcuffs, she said.
Recently free
The band members were in
Sochi to protest what they said was the lack of freedom of speech and
to record a song in English critical of Putin and called "Putin will
teach you to love the homeland."
Tolokonnikova and
Alyokhina had been imprisoned for nearly two years after being convicted
of "hooliganism" and inciting religious hatred for performing a punk
song slamming Putin in a Moscow cathedral and then posting a video of it
online.
Since their release,
just before the Olympic Games began, they have spoken to journalists
about their time behind bars, describing the conditions as squalid and
their treatment by guards as demeaning and inhumane.
A third member of Pussy Riot, Yekaterina Samutsevich, was released in 2012.
This month, other band
members said Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina were no longer part of the
group, which Verzilov said Tuesday was false.
