If the court agrees with the state prosecutor

process
The Moscow Garrison Military Court began yesterday the debate in the case of the former chief financier of the Ministry of Defense, Colonel General Georgy Oleynik. The state prosecutor asked that the defendant be sentenced to eight years in prison for abuse of power and be deprived of all titles and awards.
General Oleinik has been in custody for more than a year since the announcement of the court decision, which found him guilty of abuse of power when signing in 1996-1997 two applications for the transfer of money totaling $450 million to the account of the English company United Energy International. Then the district court pardoned him in this case, but the Main Military Prosecutor's Office brought a new charge - abuse of power when selling domestic foreign currency loan bonds to Voenbank in 1998 at a reduced price, which caused damage to the Ministry of Defense of $60 million and 344 million rubles.
Assistant Chief Military Prosecutor Alexander Derbenev, who spoke yesterday in the debate, said that during the judicial investigation, Georgy Oleinik’s guilt in exceeding his official powers in the sale of VVZ bonds to Voenbank was “fully proven” and he should be held accountable under Art. 286, part 3 of the Criminal Code, providing for punishment from three to ten years. According to prosecutor Derbenev, since this is not the first time the defendant has committed an official crime with grave consequences (he was also found guilty in a previous case), he must serve eight years in a general regime colony. At the same time, the state prosecutor asked the court to deprive Mr. Oleinik of the military rank of “Colonel General,” the orders “For Service to the Motherland in the Armed Forces” and “For Merit to the Fatherland,” as well as the title “Honored Economist of the Russian Federation.”
The defendant took the state prosecutor's speech quite calmly - probably not believing in the prospect of spending another seven years in captivity (he had already served a year in a pre-trial detention center). Mr. Oleynik’s lawyer, Mikhail Marov, told a Kommersant correspondent that, in his opinion, the prosecutor’s speech “distorted the circumstances of the case and inconsistently and incorrectly interpreted the law.” The defense’s position will be outlined in detail in court on Monday: lawyers Mikhail Marov and Alexey Dudnik will ask for a full acquittal of the general, “who carried out all his actions with the consent and on behalf of the then head of the Ministry of Defense Igor Sergeev.”
EKATERINA Kommersant-ZAPODINSKAYA

Newspaper "Kommersant" No. 114 dated 07/03/2003, page 4

Authors:

Ekaterina Zapodinskaya

General Oleinik will serve until 2010