Russia's adoption row with US grows after bruises found all over dead toddler Max Shatto The autopsy, seen by the Odessa American newspaper, found that the boy had "more than 30 bruises on his body in various stages of healing" when he was pronounced dead on Jan 21. It also reported he was the victim of sexual abuse in Russia before adoption, and had a history of self-harming up to his death. Mr Astakhov told Russian television the report was "biased and hasty" but seized on part of its conclusions to cast doubt on the parents' innocence. He said the fact the boy had been left alone meant that his adoptive parents - Alan and Laura Shatto of Gardendale, Texas - should at the least be prosecuted for negligence. "Taking into account the practice in recent years of denials from adoptive parents who were at fault for the deaths of adopted Russian children, this investigation and its results cannot be accepted as final or objective," he said. At least 20 Russian adoptees out of 60,000 taken in by US parents in the last two decades have died, and the Kremlin claims American authorities are poor at informing Moscow about the fate of children who suffer violence at the hands of their new families. In December President Vladimir Putin signed a new law banning adoption of Russian children by US parents. It was seen as retaliation against the Magnitsky Act approved by President Barack Obama a few days earlier - which imposed a US visa ban and asset freeze on alleged Russian human rights abusers. Russian officials called their ban the "Dima Yakovlev law" after a Russian toddler who died of heatstroke in Virginia in 2008 when his adoptive US father - later cleared of involuntary manslaughter - forgot him in a car for nine hours. Moscow has aggressively sought to publicise cases of alleged abuse of adopted Russian children since introducing the ban, which was condemned worldwide for robbing orphans of a chance for a new home - including some who had already met their adoptive parents and were prevented from travelling to the US. This week, pro-government media ran stories on a Russian teenager who flew home after being "nagged" by his US parents. Prosecutors in the US last night rejected the Russian accusations, urging Moscow to accept the findings and halt the mounting politicisation of the case. "We have to rely on facts, not rhetoric," Bobby Bland, the district attorney for Ector County, told The Daily Telegraph. It is normal for people to want to hold someone responsible for a death - it's just human nature. But sometimes the facts show no one is to blame. The facts show that this death was an accident. The case was presented to a Grand Jury, who had access to all information, and they decided not to bring charges. This was the death of a three-year-old child - we take it very seriously. The Shattos remain subject to a separate investigation by the Texas department of family and protective services over allegations of neglectful supervision and physical abuse. Patrick Crimmins, a spokesman for the department, said the Shattos would not face criminal prosecution even if the allegations were confirmed. They would, however, probably be placed on the state's abuse and neglect registry, which would prevent them from adopting or working with children. Neither the chief investigator at the Ector County medical examiner's office, nor Michael Brown, the Shattos' lawyer, returned telephone calls and emails requesting comment. The autopsy report said "no specific origin" could be found for the internal bleeding that caused his death, and a doctor concluded that bruises and scratches on the child's body were meanwhile consistent with "a major psychological problem." He had a history of self-harming his genitals which may have stemmed from sexual abuse by his biological mother, an alcoholic. In Moscow, critics said the raid on HRW and the offices of a series of other prominent NGOs with foreign ties was a deliberate attempt to intimidate organisations that criticise Russian authorities. Michael McFaul, the US ambassador to Moscow, has condemned past attacks on civil society activists, prompting a campaign of harassment against him by Kremlin television stations. Last month, he urged Russia to end "sensational exploitations of human tragedy" over the Shatto adoption case.