he was made a member of the collegium of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs (NKVD) of Soviet Russia. Bokii continued in that capacity until the middle of September 1919, when he was dispatched to the Eastern Front to head the special detachment of the Cheka there. In October 1919, Bokii was sent by Cheka head Felix Dzerzhinsky to Tashkent to head the operations of the Cheka the Turkestan Front. He remained there in that capacity until the effective end of the Russian Civil War in August 1920. During this interval he was also a member of the Turkestan Commission of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars (Sovnarkom). Bokii was shaken by the terror he played significant roles in. Regarding Kronstadt, Bokii later stated, "The Kronstadt events produced an indelible impression on me. I could not reconcile myself to the idea that the very sailors who took part in the October Revolution revolted against our party and our power." His further ideological disillusionment or frustration lead to his delving into esoteric mysticism in the 1920s. Bokii became head of the "special department" of the All-Union Extraordinary Commission in the last days of January 1921. Bokii has been said to have been "one of the most active creators of the Gulag system" and labelled by another historian as "the OGPU boss in charge of concentration camps" in the early 1920s. Such claims may tend to hyperbole, however, as he figures in the account of Alexander Solzhenitsyn only as the head of the Moscow troika rather than as architect or chief of the camp system itself. Bokii remained as head of the "special department" of the secret police apparatus through its various incarnations as the BChK, the GPU, and the OGPU until July 10, 1934. He was also a member of the collegium of the OGPU through this same date. In April 1923, Bokii was awarded the Order of the Red Banner in recognition of his work on behalf of the USSR. Bokii later moved to the Supreme Court of the USSR, of which he was a member until May 16, 1937. He was also head of the Chief Department of State Security of the NKVD until that same date. Arrest and execution On May 16, 1937, Bokii was suddenly arrested by the secret police and charged with conspiratorial activity. Following a lengthy investigation, Bokii was brought