Translated material
Bullet for the General
Former adviser to the head of the Federation Council was shot dead in Moscow
In the north of Moscow on Sunday, retired FSB Major General Alexander Rogachev, who at one time served as an adviser to the Speaker of the Federation Council (SF) Yegor Stroev and was his son-in-law, was shot dead. The intelligence services have so far only stated that, by all indications, he was the victim of a contract killing, but they hardly commented on specific possible versions of the assassination attempt. Although the death of even a former official of this level, by Russian standards, is an emergency on a federal scale without exaggeration. The caution of the investigation, however, is understandable. Mr. Rogachev's murder coincided with major changes in the lives of his former relatives. Just last week, Mr. Stroev lost his post as governor of the Oryol region, and his daughter Marina - the former wife of the murdered general - resigned as a member of the Federation Council, where she represented the same Oryol region.The body of 46-year-old Alexander Rogachev was discovered at about 18.00 on February 22 in a Toyota Land Cruiser, which was parked at house No. 31 on Leningradsky Prospekt, on the territory of the Young Pioneers stadium. Security guards from the nearby Parisien restaurant called the police. They were alarmed by the fact that a jeep with tinted windows had been standing outside their establishment with the engine running since seven o’clock in the morning. However, the arriving police officers initially did not find any traces of violent death on Rogachev’s body (his identity was established from documents) and assumed that he died of a heart attack. It was only during an examination at the morgue that doctors discovered a bullet wound in the head of the retired general and removed a 9 mm caliber bullet.
According to detectives, it is most likely that Mr. Rogachev's killer was in his car in the front passenger seat and shot him in the temple. The weapon itself could not be found. “Rogachev was sitting behind the wheel wearing a black hat, which acted like a bandage and absorbed all the blood,” said a source in the intelligence services. “There were no traces of blood either in the car or on the body of the deceased, which is why immediately after the discovery of the body there was an assumption of natural death.”
Regarding possible versions of the murder of Mr. Rogachev, the investigation spoke very carefully yesterday, obviously bearing in mind not only his previous work in the special services, but also his acquaintance with many former and current famous politicians and businessmen.
Alexander Rogachev was the ex-husband of Marina Rogacheva, the daughter of the former governor of the Oryol region, Yegor Stroev. According to some sources, she divorced Alexander Rogachev back in 2002; their son Alexander is now 14 years old. The murdered general himself also worked in the Federation Council in the past. From 1997 to 2000, as a seconded employee, he held the position of adviser to the chairman of the Federation Council, who at that time was his father-in-law Yegor Stroev.
Alexander Rogachev was born in the Belgorod region in 1962, in 1984 he graduated from the Oryol Higher Military Command School of Communications. Kalinin, in 1995 - Military Academy of Communications, specializing in military and administrative management. From 1984 to 2002, Mr. Rogachev served in the KGB of the USSR and FAPSI of the Russian Federation. Some media reported that shortly before marrying Mr. Stroev’s daughter, Alexander Rogachev was allegedly only a major at the Oryol FAPSI school, and after just a few years he made a rapid career, rising to the rank of general and taking the position of first deputy head of the department’s Main Directorate. In 2002, he resigned and went into business, where he was no less successful.
Almost immediately, Mr. Rogachev was appointed vice president of the AFK Sistema concern, Russia's largest diversified company focused on the services market, whose assets include MTS, Comstar-UTS, the RTI Systems concern, Sitronics, “Intourist”, “Detsky Mir”, etc. In 2005, he left the company of his own free will, but, as reported, at that time he received a large stake in the Oryol cellular company OJSC Recom. Initially, the state Oryol share in Recom was transferred to minority shareholders through multiple transfers of shares, and Atlant LLC, owned by Marina Rogacheva, also became a co-owner of Recom. Later, Alexander Rogachev successfully sold his stake in MTS (the transaction amount was unofficially estimated at $110 million). Mr. Rogachev, as reported at various times by the media, also owned a large stake in the Oryol confectionery factory. In addition, along with businessman Alexander Chigirinsky (brother of billionaire Shalva Chigirinsky), he was allegedly one of the founders of the Nordex Firm company, engaged in the management and maintenance of real estate.
In November 2001, Alexander Rogachev was mentioned in the media in connection with an accident in which he was involved while driving a car that allegedly belonged to Alexander Chigirinsky. His Mercedes 500 crashed into an oak tree near Dmitrovskoye Highway. The major general, who was taken to the Central Clinical Hospital with injuries, allegedly did not have a driver’s license with him.