The Vostochny case has been called into question

Boris Titov turned to Yuri Chaika.
14.08.2019
Kommersant
Origin source
As it became known to Kommersant, the Commissioner for the Protection of Entrepreneurs' Rights, Boris Titov, appealed to the Prosecutor General of Russia Yury Chaika with a request to once again verify the legality of the criminal prosecution of the four remaining persons in the pre-trial detention center of the high-profile case of theft of 2.5 billion rubles. Vostochny Bank - French citizen Philippe Delpal, as well as Maxim Vladimirov, Ivan Zyuzin and Vagan Abgarian. The business ombudsman also asks for their release from custody. Earlier, the supervision did not agree with the arguments of Mr. Titov.

In his appeal to the prosecutor general, Boris Titov explains that he received several more appeals from the defenders accused of especially large-scale fraud (part 4 of article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) of the defendants in the Baring Vostok case. The business ombudsman again recalls: the circumstances of this criminal case, which is being investigated by the State Investigative Committee of the Investigative Committee of Russia (TFR), "may indicate an attempt to transfer civil law relations into illegal and unjustified criminal prosecution of specific individuals." According to him, the value of shares of the International Financial Technology Group (IFTG) companies that appears in the materials of the criminal case also "raises objective doubts." Boris Titov emphasizes that all four persons involved in the investigation are businessmen or heads of a credit institution, and therefore, in accordance with the Criminal Procedure Code, such a preventive measure as placement in a pre-trial detention center cannot be applied to them. However, neither the investigation nor the courts paid due attention to this.

“I am sending appeals and requesting a re-examination of the legality and validity of the criminal prosecution of the above persons, as well as taking measures to change the preventive measure in the form of detention in respect of entrepreneurs,” the letter to Boris Titov said in a letter to Kommersant.

It should be noted that earlier Boris Titov had already addressed both the Prosecutor General’s Office and the Investigative Committee in connection with the Baring Vostok case, insisting, in particular, that his defendants be allowed to meet with relatives. Mr. Titov’s apparatus has so far received two responses from the supervisory authority, which stated that the lawfulness of the detention and suspicion had been verified by the courts of the first and appeal instances, and that the arguments about the commission of a crime in the field of entrepreneurial activity were checked by the prosecutor’s office itself, but “did not find confirmation”. Interestingly, two almost identical answers were given, despite the changes in the criminal case. Recall that in April, the founder of Baring Vostok, Michael Kalvi, and the ex-head of Vostochny Bank Alexei Kordichev, who pleaded guilty and testified to other accomplices, were transferred to house arrests.

The criminal case initiated by the Central Investigation Department of the Investigative Committee against Michael Kalvi, as well as his business partners Vagan Abgaryan, Director General of the First Collection Bureau (PKB) Maxim Vladimirov, Director of the Finance Department of Baring Vostok Capital Partners Philip Delpal, Investment Director of Baring Vostok Capital Partners Ivan Zyuzin and Advisor to the Chairman of the Board of PJSC Norvik Bank Alexei Kordichev, the story of the repayment of a debt of 2.5 billion rubles that arose at the Design Bureau in front of Vostochny Bank. According to the investigation, Mr. Calvi, who owned the PCB, persuaded his accomplices to approve the debt settlement agreement, according to which the bank received 59.9% of the shares of the Luxembourg company IFTG as compensation. The criminal case was initiated at the request of Sherzod Yusupov, a member of the board of directors and co-owner of Vostochny, whose auditors estimated the shares received by the bank at 600 thousand rubles. Meanwhile, in a letter to Boris Titov, citing other sources, the disputed shares are estimated at 2.6 billion rubles.

Society

Previous Article
Next article