The head of a federal subject was put on the federal wanted list Alexey Shalaev shalaev@smi.ru June 28 16:26 MCK

" Izvestia " writes that the governor of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug (NAO) Vladimir Butov has been put on the federal wanted list by the district prosecutor's office . “The governor, who has not appeared on the territory of the region entrusted to him for six months, is being sought by the police in order to bring charges against him under Part 2 of Article 285 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (abuse of official powers by a person holding a public position). This article provides for a punishment of up to 7 years in prison,” the newspaper writes.

Comment: The governor was put on the wanted list on June 25, the day after Putin's press conference . This fact attracted the attention of Izvestia and Kommersant insofar as a Nenets journalist asked Vladimir Putin a question: does the federal government know that this is the third consecutive Nenets prosecutor who has been removed as soon as he begins to investigate criminal cases in which the local governor appears? “I don’t know anything about this,” the president replied, “but today I’ll talk about it with Prosecutor General Vladimir Ustinov .” Both publications are inclined to believe that Putin really talked to Ustinov.

According to Izvestia and Kommersant, the criminal case that led to the governor being put on the wanted list (in total, Butov appears in five criminal investigations) is related to the theft of funds allocated for “northern delivery”. “In 1997, as a result of cunning calculations between Purneftegaz and the Nenets Autonomous Okrug, out of 47 billion non-denominated rubles allocated to the district from the federal budget, 8 billion disappeared somewhere. The Accounts Chamber of the Russian Federation began to check where they went. Its auditors found out that as a result of the same offsets, in addition to the mentioned 8 billion, the same amount went to the account of the Sir-Vark company, and also 22 billion was received by the Trans-Nao company. Law enforcement agencies believe that both companies had nothing to do with the importation, but were directly related to Governor Butov. According to the same data, the money was transferred through front companies registered to deceased or non-existent persons,” Kommersant sets out the essence of the case.

However, not everything is clear about the wanted notice. The head of the district police department , Viktor Vorobyov, told Izvestia that he “knows nothing about the search.” Acting NAO prosecutor Andrei Mukhin said that no charges had been brought : “Butov has not been in the district for several months. His name actually appears in criminal cases. But to bring charges, a person is needed.” The head of the information and analytical department of the district administration, Dmitry Medvedev, told Izvestia that “officially Vladimir Yakovlevich Butov is on sick leave, and according to the prosecutor’s office and the district police department, the information about him being wanted is not confirmed .”

Sergei Stepashin , confirming that the case against Butov was initiated based on the materials of the audit of the Accounts Chamber, noted that according to his data , Butov is not hiding from law enforcement agencies, but simply does not appear for interrogations .

Unexpectedly, Deputy Prosecutor General of the Northwestern Federal District Vladimir Zubrin stood up for Butov. He considers the charges brought against Butov to be premature . Zubrin noted that they are currently given instructions to act. Prosecutor of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug Zoya Kozhevina to cancel the decision to bring charges and to put Butov on the federal wanted list , Interfax reports.

According to him, the case has not been fully investigated and, secondly, the head of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug is currently on sick leave in Moscow, so the governor could not come for investigative actions . For the “objectivity of the investigation,” the case will be transferred to the prosecutor’s office of the Arkhangelsk region , and the department of the Prosecutor General’s Office of the Russian Federation in the Northwestern Federal District will oversee this criminal case. “I also have serious questions for the head of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug,” said Zubrin. “But it is necessary to act only within the framework of the law.”

If putting the governor on the wanted list really was the result of a conversation between Putin and Ustinov, the actions of the deputy prosecutor general look rather strange. Most likely, in fact, this action was the result of an initiative “from below”, in the local prosecutor’s office . She has been sharpening her teeth on Butov for a long time - the district prosecutor Alexander Lykov was fired three weeks ago, after he once again intensified the investigation into “gubernatorial” criminal cases.