| The future was predicted for the person accused of stealing money from Moscow City Another scandal erupted in the Presnensky District Court of Moscow, where yesterday the hearing continued in the case of the general director of Spetsstroyservis-2000 LLC, Evgeniy Yankovsky, accused of embezzling 1 billion rubles allocated for the construction of the Moscow City international business center. One of the witnesses actually accused the court of a biased attitude towards the accused, saying that the victim Andrei Khovanov “agreed with the court” that Mr. Yankovsky “would be sentenced to nine years.” The prosecutor, who subsequently spoke in the debate, actually demanded that the defendant be sentenced to ten years in prison.
According to investigators, events developed like this. In 1999, Gazprombank transferred five bills of exchange worth 1 billion rubles to City OJSC. for the construction of a heating and power network for a business complex. Then City's subsidiary, CJSC Cityenergo (later controlled by Gazprom), transferred these bills under a contract to Spetsstoyservis-2000, which was supposed to carry out work on the construction of the network. However, the general director of the company, Evgeny Yankovsky, did not even think about starting construction. It turns out that they had already developed a plan to steal money. According to this scheme, Yankovsky first exchanged five Gazprombank promissory notes for twenty Gazprom promissory notes. The entrepreneur exchanged eight of these twenty for two promissory notes of Legprombank controlled by him. Then all these securities were presented for payment or sold through shell companies created by Yankovsky using fake passports, including those of deceased people.
At the same time, the criminal case regarding the theft of bills of exchange was separated in June 2002 from another case - the theft of Legprombank assets. And in April 2004, Evgeniy Yankovsky appeared in court on charges of fraud and money laundering.
Yankovsky did not admit his guilt. According to his lawyer Robert Zinoviev, Yankovsky never received any bills of exchange at all. Gazprombank's bills of exchange were transferred as investments for the construction of Moscow City only on paper, the defense assures, but in fact they never left their native walls. And this was necessary in order to obtain tax exemption, which was due under the Moscow legislation in force at that time.
The first scandal erupted last week, when Yankovsky, who had been under recognizance all this time, was arrested and placed in Butyrka prison. The basis for this was a complaint from the victim - the general director of Cityenergo Andrei Khovanov. He told the court that on September 26, on the Simferopol highway, unknown persons fired at his car. According to Khovanov, Yankovsky could have ordered the assassination attempt. This, according to the victim, was confirmed by the fact that shortly before the assassination attempt, Yankovsky’s business partner Alexander Shoror approached him and asked him to change his testimony in court.
But what Alexander Shoror himself told yesterday shocked everyone present. “I know that Khovanov made several statements to the police regarding the assassination attempt. But I am sure that the attempt was falsified,” said the witness. - Khovanov told me that Yankovsky needs to be imprisoned at all costs, and this is not due to the desire to return the money, but simply to the desire for revenge. Khovanov is one hundred percent sure that Yankovsky will be convicted. He said that he would be sentenced to nine years and that he had already agreed with the court.”
After this statement, the defense immediately demanded that Yankovsky’s preventive measure be changed to a written undertaking not to leave the place, and also expressed its lack of confidence in the composition of the court and demanded a recusal. Judge Elena Litvinenko did not find the lawyers' arguments convincing and announced the completion of the judicial investigation. Yankovsky himself, who had replaced an expensive suit and patent leather boots with worn sweatpants and old felt boots, said that he was unable to continue attending the meeting. “I was woken up at six in the morning, and since then I haven’t had breakfast or lunch. Now I have a terrible headache, and I am physically unable to listen to the prosecutor with sufficient attention,” said the defendant and asked the court to call an ambulance. The arriving paramedic noted high blood pressure and suggested that the headache could have occurred due to severe fatigue. But the court considered that since the defendant’s life was not in danger, he was quite capable of listening to the opinion of the prosecution.
Prosecutor Dmitry Minkov said that Yankovsky’s guilt has been fully proven, and therefore he should be sentenced to ten years in prison. “Our task now is to achieve a complete acquittal of Yankovsky. This case was completely falsified. And I am sure that this could not have happened without the participation of Khovanov, on whose order the Prosecutor General’s Office could have acted,” said lawyer Pavel Terentyevsky after the meeting. Ekaterina BUTORINA |
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