================================================================================ POLESIAN PARLIAMENTARY COMMISSION — CASE STATUS Case Ref: 2025-KRE-0041 Subject: Krepost Estate, Polesia — Ongoing Investigation Lead: D. Koval, Senior Investigator Opened: 2025-05-28 Last Updated: 2026-03-03 Status: ACTIVE — STALLED (access issues, see below) ================================================================================ SUMMARY ------- Investigation initiated following whistleblower complaint WB-2025-0193 (former domestic staff, identity protected). Complainant reported: - Exploitation of contracted musicians ("The Herd") under coercive conditions resembling indentured servitude - Presence of minors on estate receiving religious instruction of unclear legal standing (no registered school, no curriculum approval) - "Atmospheric disturbance" affecting health of residents (initially dismissed — subsequently corroborated by audio forensic analysis, see: NOTE-014) - Concerns re: missing persons (289 historical, 1 contemporary — HC-TERM-2012, whereabouts unknown since ████/2024) Complaint was initially closed 2025-06-09 (no jurisdiction — ecclesiastical exemption under Article 14 of the Polesian Religious Bodies Act). Reopened 2025-07-02 following parliamentary question from ████████████████ (opposition) re: scope of ecclesiastical exemptions. Commission authorised preliminary investigation same date. EVIDENCE SEIZED --------------- Site visit conducted 2025-07-18/19 under warrant PPC-W-2025-0041. Seizure conducted by Sgt. M. Pavluk with two junior officers. Keeper (G. ██████████) was present throughout. Cooperative but obstructive — answered all questions with "that would be covered by DIR-7.1" or "I would need to consult the Principal before responding." Access granted: Ground floor, Keeper's office (K-01), Archive (K-04), Rehearsal Room, Kitchen, Corridors, Room E-02 (classroom) Access denied: Sub-Level 1, Sub-Level 2 ("the Sanctum"), Principal's quarters, any room described as "private residential" Reason given: DIR-9.4 (ecclesiastical exemption) — Krepost counsel present, cited precedent from 2003 ruling (██████████ v. Polesian State, unreported) Sgt. Pavluk's report notes the following: - Cabinet 3, Drawer 1 in Room K-04 was locked. Keeper stated he did not have the key. Lock was forced on-site under warrant authority. Contents: 3 executed NDAs, 1 blank template. Keeper did not object to seizure but stated: "those documents are legally privileged." - 3 pages appear to be missing from the incident register (Cabinet 4). Pages correspond to entries dated ████/2023. Keeper stated the pages "were never filed" and that the gap was "an administrative error." - Minors (est. age 6-10, number: ████) were present in Room E-02 during seizure. Instructor identified as ████████████████ (Herd member, codename "The Violin"). Worksheet seized from desk. Children appeared healthy but "unusually quiet" (Pavluk's words). - Heir (Andrei Zagonov) was encountered in corridor near Library. Appeared intoxicated. Did not respond to questions. Laptop was visible in his quarters (door open). Seized under warrant. Password-protected — bypassed by forensic unit 2026-02-02. - Sgt. Pavluk reports persistent low-frequency vibration throughout the estate, increasing in intensity on lower floors. He described it as "like standing inside a machine that isn't running." Equipment check confirmed vibration is not attributable to HVAC, plumbing, or any visible mechanical source. Recording made (see: audio/). Second site visit conducted 2026-02-14 (photographs only). Dymtrus (estate guard) accompanied officers. No access to Sub-Level areas. Dymtrus stated: "I don't go down there. Nobody goes down there except the Keeper." EVIDENCE INDEX -------------- EV-001 Correspondence archive (Keeper — Office of the President), 2019–2025. 13 pages. Seized from Room K-04, Cabinet 2. Covers church-state relations, Ksenia's border crossing, parliamentary inquiry (2021), death of Lady Anastasia, and presidential condolence visit. Final page is a corrupted recovery of deleted messages. Subject lines reference "The Succession Programme" and "The Hum" directly. EV-002 Personnel files (consolidated registry). 28 pages. Seized from Room K-04, Cabinet 3. Complete dossiers for all 8 active personnel plus Lady Anastasia (deceased). Includes medical summaries, psychological profiles, incident history, access tier definitions, Sanctum access log, and the Keeper's self-authored file. Anomalous Sanctum entry (2025-094) logged 90 minutes before Lady Anastasia's death — unassigned keycard. EV-003 Non-disclosure agreements (Form HC-NDA-1). 12 pages. Seized from Room K-04, Cabinet 3, Drawer 1 (forced). Three executed copies (HC-TERM-2007, HC-TERM-2012, HC-TERM-2018) plus blank template. NDA term extends to the death of the Principal or beyond. Clause 4.3 prohibits reproduction of the Principal's compositions "including humming." HC-TERM-2018 was signed at 03:40 with no witness present. Keeper's handwritten note on final page: "She asked: 'Will it follow me?'" EV-004 Personal statement, Everard (selected extracts). Candidacy file CF-07-2002. Extracted from original 70-page handwritten manuscript (Room K-04, Cabinet 5, Drawer 4). Title: "The Architecture of Obedience." Submitted August 2002, age 25. Subject describes obedience as "the most violent act a person can commit against themselves" and conducting as "an engineer of surrender." Marginal annotations by previous Keeper (served 2003–2018): "Either a zealot or a psychopath. Useful in both cases." Current Keeper's annotation notes subject has not left the estate since 2016 and has not placed a telephone call since 2018. Pages 55–67 of the original were not extracted. Keeper's note states they have been "flagged for the restricted archive" without further explanation. NOTE: This document was not seized on-site. It was delivered to our offices on 2026-02-27 in an unmarked envelope with no return address. Postmark: ████████████, Polesia. The envelope contained a photocopy, not an original. We do not know who sent it. PHOTOS-002 Hard drive images — Everard. 1x Samsung 870 EVO (500GB), removed from desktop unit in Room E-04 during second site visit (2026-02-14). Drive was not password-protected. Forensic imaging completed 2026-02-19. Contents of note: - 14,300+ audio files (.wav, .flac), predominantly rehearsal recordings spanning 2014–2025 - 340+ scanned score pages (see: cross-ref with EV-007) - 1x folder labelled "PRINCIPAL" containing 47 subfolders, each containing a single audio file. Files are titled by date only. Earliest: 2003-09-14.wav. Latest: 2025-████-████.wav. Combined duration: ████ hours. Forensic audio team reports the content is "a single voice, speaking or dictating, at extremely low volume." Enhancement in progress. - 1x text file (notepad), last modified 2025-10-03, titled "notes.txt". Contents: 17 lines. The first line reads: "He has stopped composing." The last line reads: "████████████████████████████████." - Browser history: negligible. No external email client. No social media. No communications software of any kind. The machine has never connected to a network outside the estate. EV-006 Transcript — Herd intake interview, Ksenia. 7 pages. Transcript of final-stage intake interview conducted by the Keeper on 29 July 2023 at 01:40. Duration: 1 hr 47 mins. Subject had not slept for two nights prior. Subject describes homelessness, estrangement from parents, street performance. Keeper reads back talent scout's psychological assessment: "Psychologically ██████████." Subject guesses "broken." Keeper corrects: "Receptive." Subject signs Standard Herd Contract without reading it. Exit clause not discussed. Exit clause not read aloud. Independent legal advice not offered. Subject's stated reason for trust: "You gave me water. You listened." Keeper's closing note: "I am noting what the procedure is." Cross-reference: EV-001 p. 7 (border crossing correspondence), EV-002 pp. 12–14 (Ksenia personnel file), EV-003 (contract provisions re: exit). The intake processing checklist in EV-002 has two unchecked items: "Exit clause discussed" and "Family notification completed." This transcript confirms both omissions were deliberate. EV-007 Musical score — "Funeral Mass" (SCORE-2025-001). 47 pages, hand-notated. Seized from Rehearsal Room (R-01), conductor's stand. Attributed to the Principal. Notation is irregular. Several passages appear to be deliberately unplayable. Musicologist (contracted, Prof. ████████████, University of ████████████) described the work as "either a masterpiece of post-tonal composition or the output of a mind that has departed from conventional musical logic entirely. I cannot determine which. I have been unable to sleep since reviewing it." Score is dated ████/2025. Title page bears a single handwritten annotation in a different hand (identified as the Keeper's): "For after." EV-008 Security ledger — Ivan Petrov, pp. 41–42. Two pages extracted from a handwritten ledger found in Room E-06 (Ivan's quarters) during second site visit. Ledger appears to be an unofficial log maintained by Ivan independently of the estate's formal incident register. Entries are terse, written in a mix of Russian and Polesian. Pages 41–42 cover the period ████/████/2025 through ████/████/2025. Entries of note: - Night patrol log with timestamps accurate to the minute. Ivan records the location of every Herd member observed during each circuit. - Entry dated ████/████/2025: "03:14 — someone in corridor SL-1. Not Keeper. Too small. Moved wrong. Gone before I reached the stairs." - Entry dated ████/████/2025 (same date as Lady Anastasia's death): "02:50 — K. [Ksenia] not in room. Found courtyard 04:55. She was standing. Not moving. Cold. Brought her in. She did not speak." Followed by: "Lady dead by morning. Keeper says heart. Keeper always says heart." - Final entry on p. 42: "P. [Pedro] in Library again. Friday. No card. How." Remainder of ledger was not seized (oversight — Sgt. Pavluk reports Ivan placed his hand flat on the ledger when asked to surrender it and said "mine." Pavluk did not press the point. I have submitted a supplementary warrant application for the full ledger. Pending.) EV-009 Journal — Andrei Zagonov. Recovered from seized laptop (see: site visit 1, above). Password bypass completed 2026-02-02. Device contained a single active document: a digital journal maintained in a plain text editor. Entries span 2024-████ through 2025-████. ████ entries total. Document is ████ pages when printed. Content is highly personal and intermittently incoherent. Entries alternate between lucid self-analysis and passages that appear to have been written while severely intoxicated. Recurring themes: guilt regarding Lady Anastasia, contempt for the Principal, obsessive references to "the blood" and what it "carries," and a persistent conviction that someone in the Herd is planning to kill him. Entries of evidentiary significance: - 2024-████: "Everard cornered me in the corridor today. He wanted to talk about the performance. He always wants to talk about the performance. He looked at me like I was communion wine. I told him to get away from me. He wept. A grown man. Weeping in a corridor because I wouldn't let him worship me. This house makes people into dogs." - 2025-████: "Pedro was in the Library again. My library. He was reading ████████████████. Why. He has no business with that file. He smiled when he saw me. That smile is a weapon. I said nothing. I should have said something." - 2025-████ (post Lady Anastasia's death): "She knew. She told me she knew. She said the sound in the walls had changed. She said it used to hum and now it screams. I thought she was being dramatic. She was not being dramatic. I can hear it now. I can hear it from the Library. It is getting louder. Something is wrong with the house. Something is wrong with him. The old man is dying and the house knows it." - 2025-████ (final entry): "████████████████████████████ ██████████████████████████████████████████████████████ ████████████████. I am the last Zagonov. I do not want to be the last Zagonov. I did not ask for this blood. ████████████████████████." Full transcript of journal available on request. Classified RESTRICTED pending legal review (privacy, self-incrimination). INTERVIEWS ---------- INT-001 Former domestic (anonymous) 2025-06-11 Cooperative but vague. Refused to give name. Key quote: "the house remembers what you clean." Described vibration, sleep disturbance, nosebleeds. Employed 2019-2021. Left voluntarily. No NDA signed (domestic staff apparently exempt). INT-003 HC-TERM-2007 (former Herd) 2025-08-19 Most cooperative witness to date. Confirmed existence of NDA (subsequently seized as EV-003). Described Classification E phenomena in detail — persistent auditory hallucination, object displacement, "a feeling of being observed by the building itself." Confirmed ongoing neurological evaluations (annual) arranged by Estate. Stated that results since 2020 have been "different" but would not elaborate. Requested recording be destroyed after interview. Request denied. INT-004 HC-TERM-2018 (former Herd) 2025-09-03 CANCELLED. Attended offices at agreed time. Sat down. Recording started. Said: "It followed me." Stood up. Left. Total duration: 43 seconds. Has not responded to further contact. Current address confirmed — she is there. She simply does not respond. INT-005 Beltrov (via counsel) 2025-12-09 Denied knowledge of Succession Programme. Denied awareness of any financial irregularity. Denied personal relationship with Keeper beyond "professional correspondence." This is directly contradicted by EV-001 (correspondence archive), pp. 4-7, in which Beltrov discusses "managing the parliamentary question" and refers to the Keeper as "Grisha" (diminutive). INT-006 Grigori / The Keeper 2026-01-15 REFUSED. Letter received from Krepost counsel (████████████████ LLP) stating Keeper is "not available for interview at this time." No alternative date offered. Letter cc'd to Office of the President (noted but not pursued). OUTSTANDING ISSUES ------------------ 1. SUB-LEVEL ACCESS Three warrant applications submitted. First two rejected by Magistrate ████████████ (cited insufficient grounds + ecclesiastical exemption). Third application (REQ-sublevel-warrant_DRAFT) is with Asst. Prosecutor Zelenko as of 2026-02-20. She has expressed "sympathy" but has not signed. She asked me: "Do you understand what you're asking me to authorise?" I said I did. She said: "I don't think you do." UPDATE 2026-03-01: Zelenko has requested additional supporting material before signing. I have forwarded EV-008 (Ivan's ledger, corridor SL-1 entry) and the relevant Sanctum access log entries from EV-002 (anomalous entry 2025-094, unassigned keycard, 90 minutes before Lady Anastasia's death). If the Sub-Level access log and Ivan's independent patrol record both show unexplained movement in the same timeframe, that is grounds. It has to be. 2. HC-TERM-2012 — MISSING Former Herd member, departed 2012. Last known address verified vacant since ████/2024. Missing persons referral filed 2026-02-18. No response from police yet. This is the individual who was caught performing a derivative of the Principal's composition in 2016 (see: EV-003, enforcement log ENF-2016-002). They have not been in contact with the Estate since 2017. Or with anyone else, as far as we can determine. 3. MINORS Referral to child welfare made 2025-10-01. Outcome: ████████████████. I have followed up three times. Each time I am told the matter is "under review." The children are still on the estate. They are still being taught by ████████████████. The curriculum is still unapproved. 4. THE HUM Audio forensic analysis (NOTE-014) confirms persistent low-frequency vibration at approximately 23 Hz throughout the estate. No mechanical source identified. The recording was made on the ground floor. If the vibration increases in intensity on lower floors, as Sgt. Pavluk reported, the levels in Sub-Level 2 may exceed safe exposure limits. We cannot confirm this without access. UPDATE 2026-02-28: PHOTOS-002 audio files forwarded to forensic audio team. Preliminary report states the 47 recordings in the "PRINCIPAL" folder exhibit a persistent background frequency consistent with NOTE-014 findings. The frequency is present in recordings dating back to 2003. It has increased in amplitude by approximately ████ dB over the 22-year span. The team has asked if the recordings were made in the Sanctum. I do not know. Everard's hard drive does not log geolocation. But if they were, this is the first acoustic evidence of Sub-Level conditions we have. 5. AUTOPSY — LADY ANASTASIA Ecclesiastical privilege invoked three times to prevent independent medical assessment. The correspondence (EV-001, p. 2) shows the Office of the President raised questions about the circumstances of the death but did not pursue. EV-009 (Andrei's journal) contains a post-mortem entry stating "she knew" and referencing a change in the vibration prior to her death. EV-008 (Ivan's ledger) places Ksenia outside in the courtyard in the hours following the death in a non-responsive state. The Sanctum access log (EV-002, entry 2025-094) shows an unidentified person entering the Sanctum at 03:22 — 68 minutes before the recorded time of death. The Keeper attended at 04:45. The gap between 03:29 and 04:45 is unaccounted for. We do not have a body. We do not have an autopsy. We do not have an independent cause of death. We have "cardiac arrest" from the Keeper and a coroner's office that stopped asking. 6. THE PRINCIPAL The score (EV-007) is titled "Funeral Mass." The correspondence (EV-001) references preparations for a death that has not occurred. Ecclesiastical privilege has been invoked three times to prevent independent medical assessment. We do not know the Principal's current condition. We do not know if "alive" is the correct word. EV-004 (Everard's personal statement, 2002) contains the line: "I believe that when he stops composing, he will die." PHOTOS-002 contains a text file dated 2025-10-03. First line: "He has stopped composing." 7. PEDRO — LIBRARY ACCESS EV-008 (Ivan's ledger) and EV-009 (Andrei's journal) independently confirm that Pedro has been accessing the Library on Fridays without authorised keycard access. EV-002 (personnel file, KRE-PER-007) confirms his keycard does not include Library clearance. The personnel file notes an "anomalous entry at 23:47 using card KC-████" — a card not assigned to current personnel. The Keeper was aware of this pattern and had delayed processing a surveillance request in order to "observe further." Andrei's journal indicates Pedro was reading a specific file (name redacted in journal). What was he looking for. 8. COOPERATION None. The Estate responds to all enquiries through counsel. The Keeper has refused interview. The Principal is "not available." The Herd members have not been made available for individual interview. The only person who has spoken to us voluntarily is someone who left nine years ago, and she asked us to destroy the recording. UPDATE: The arrival of EV-004 by post suggests someone inside or formerly inside the estate is willing to provide material anonymously. I have not disclosed receipt of this document to Krepost counsel. I am treating it as a voluntary disclosure from an unidentified source. If further material arrives by the same channel, we may have a second whistleblower. PERSONAL NOTE (D. Koval) ------------------------ I am adding this because I want it on file. I have been to the Krepost twice. Both times I have felt the vibration described by witnesses. Both times I have experienced a sense of unease that I cannot attribute to the circumstances of the investigation alone. I am a professional. I have conducted investigations in prisons, psychiatric facilities, and active crime scenes. I have never felt what I felt in that building. On the second visit (2026-02-14), I stood in the corridor outside the door to Sub-Level 1 for approximately four minutes while Dymtrus radioed the Keeper for permission to open it. Permission was denied. During those four minutes, the vibration was strong enough that I could feel it in my teeth. I am not a superstitious person. I am noting this for completeness. The warrant application is with Zelenko. If she signs it, we go back in. If she doesn't, I don't know what happens to this case. ADDENDUM (2026-03-03): I have now read Everard's personal statement three times. I have read Ksenia's intake transcript twice. I have read Andrei's journal in full. I have listened to eleven of the forty-seven recordings recovered from Everard's hard drive. I have stopped listening for the time being because I was having difficulty sleeping and I do not think the two things are unrelated. What I want to note is this: every document we have recovered tells the same story from a different angle. The Keeper recruits vulnerable people. He recruits them legally. He recruits them gently. He gives them water and listens to them speak and tells them they are not broken. And then he closes the door. Everything that happens after that door closes is inside the architecture. Ksenia was twenty years old. She had been homeless for three weeks. She signed a contract with no exit clause at three o'clock in the morning because a man gave her a glass of water and told her she was unfinished. The Keeper documented this. He documented exactly what it was. And then he filed it. I want the Sub-Level warrant. I want to know what is in that building. — D. Koval 03/03/2026 ================================================================================ END OF STATUS — NEXT UPDATE DUE: 10/03/2026 ================================================================================