Ex-minister Mikhail Abyzov complains about investigators

Former official dissatisfied with the actions of the investigation.
24.07.2019
Kommersant
Origin source
The Moscow Basman Court extended for three months the detention of the former Open Government Minister Mikhail Abyzov and his alleged accomplices, who are accused of organizing and participating in the criminal community, as well as embezzling 4 billion rubles from energy companies. The ex-official himself called the accusations absurd, but this did not affect the preventive measure.

At the meeting of the Basmanny Court, where they considered a petition to extend the arrest of Mikhail Abyzov, ex-general director of the Rukom group Nikolay Stepanov and the director of economics and finance of REMiS JSC Galina Freidenberg, the former minister came with a bandaged upper phalanxes of his left fingers, at the same time on the nameless there was a picture of the heart. As one of the lawyers of Mr. Abyzov explained later, there were eight of them altogether, nothing terrible happened to the ex-official: he rubbed his fingers when he was washing in cold water.

Investigator Sergey Stepanov, who is in charge of the case, petitioned for the extension of his arrest until October 25. Arguing his proposal, Mr. Stepanov especially stressed that the defendants in the case, including the ex-minister, “do not cooperate with the investigation, do not give explanations of what they have done, except what they consider necessary”. The investigator also noted that, once at liberty, the ex-minister may hide, since he has a passport with Schengen and British visas, and in offshores he has companies and bank accounts.

Recall that Mikhail Abyzov, Nikolay Stepanov, Galina Freidenberg, and Alexander Pelipasov, Chairman of the Board of Directors of First Construction Fund LLC, Maxim Rusakov, Deputy General Director of Ru-Com LLC and Sergey Ilyichev, General Director of Regional Electric Networks, (three The Basmanny court also extended the last on Tuesday the term of detention until October 25) the TFR imposes Art. 210 of the Criminal Code (organization of the criminal community and participation in it) and Part 4 of Art. 159 of the Criminal Code (fraud on a large scale). According to investigators, in the period from April 2011 to November 2014, Mr. Abyzov, being the beneficiary of a number of offshore companies, created and headed an organized criminal community, whose activities were not related to entrepreneurship, but were aimed at embezzlement of funds. As a result, according to the materials of the case, the former minister and his alleged accomplices, having deceived the shareholders of Siberian Energy Company, JSC and Regional Electric Networks, who were engaged in the production and transmission of electricity in the Novosibirsk region, stole funds of these companies in the amount of 4 billion rubles. And all this money, according to the investigation, was taken abroad.
The persons involved do not admit guilt, insisting that civil law relations have become the subject of a criminal case. It should be noted that as part of the investigation, as reported by the representative of the Basmanny Court Yunona Tsarev, a security arrest was imposed on Mr. Abyzov’s funds in the amount of about 9 billion rubles, as well as on various property of the former minister. Since the value of these assets far exceeds the amount of damage in the case, it can be very likely to assume that the arrest was made in the expectation that the prosecutor’s office would later go to court with the claim that the state’s funds and property of the ex-minister be received as a result of violations of anti-corruption laws.

In turn, the defense of Mr. Abyzov, who offered to place him under house arrest or release him on bail, argued that the arguments of the investigation in favor of his detention in the SIZO were not confirmed by anything, and the accusation against him was unfounded. Lawyer Sergey Drozd noted that the measure of restraint should also be softened due to the fact that “Abyzov’s mother and children are in a helpless state”. The defenders expressed bewilderment about how, being a minister, Mr. Abyzov could lead the criminal community.

The speech of Mr. Abyzov himself was quite long and very emotional. “The investigation needs only one thing from me - that I stipulate myself and other people. How can I co-ordinate those whom I have not seen, while being at a meeting of the government of the Russian Federation, he said in court. All my activities were under the supervision of services, any of my contacts were recorded, including on sensitive sites. After all, one can turn to them, find out all the information of interest, but the investigation does not do anything ... I am imputed to the 210th article of the Criminal Code, where there are 15 to 20 years in a penal colony. Why not terrorism, not banditry? ”The former official also complained about the pressure from the investigation.

The property allegedly affiliated with me, the assets were arrested, all this for 20 billion rubles with imputed damage of 4 billion, with a maximum fine of not more than 500 million rubles. What is it like? - Mr. Abyzov was indignant.

“Now these assets are being arrested in order to destroy the business, in order to put pressure on me ... I did not commit a crime that I was suspected of and accused by the investigation ... During the four months I was in the SIZO, I realized that this is all a big, global absurdity.”

However, the arguments of the accused and the defense did not convince the chairman Arthur Karpov, and he granted the request of the investigation, extending the period of arrest to the defendants until October 25.

Crime

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