In the Meshchansky Court of Moscow, preliminary hearings began in the Lebedev case

In the Meshchansky Court of Moscow, on Thursday at 12:30, preliminary hearings began in the criminal case of the head of the MFI Menatep Platon Lebedev, Interfax reports.

Lebedev was taken to the court of the court in handcuffs. In front of the court building, an independent public group “Conscience” arranged a picket in his support. For public security purposes, security was strengthened in the court building.

At the preliminary hearings, the defense will be announced by a number of petitions, the start date of the trial will be set.

The Prosecutor General’s Office accuses Platon Lebedev of that in 1994, working as president of OJSC CB Menatep (Bank Menatep) and being a member of the Board of Directors of the AOO MFI Menatep and the joint Russian-Swiss enterprise Russian Trust and Trade, entered the organized group created by the chairman of the board of directors of these structures Mikhail Khodorkovsky. The purpose of the criminal group, according to the conclusions of the investigation, was to take possession of the shares of Russian enterprises during privatization.

According to the Prosecutor General, Lebedev, together with Khodorkovsky, "led the activities of this group in the process of committing crimes."

According to investigators, he was supposed to issue bank guarantees to fake commercial organizations, on behalf of which shares on the fulfillment of financial obligations were bought fraud, which were taken when issuing transactions of sale and sale, knowingly knowing that these obligations would not be fulfilled.

In total, Lebedev, like Khodorkovsky, is charged with 11 episodes of unlawful activities, which are provided for by seven articles of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.

The Prosecutor General’s Office accuses Lebedev of fraud in a large -scale organized group, of causing property damage by deception or abuse of trust, in failure to fulfill the court decision, tax evasion, both as an individual and as part of a group of persons by prior conspiracy.

In particular, Lebedev is suspected of the theft in 1994 of 20 percent of the shares of Apatit OJSC, belonging to the state, in the amount of 283 million $ 142 thousand.

The damage caused by Lebedev’s actions is estimated by a consequence of $ 1 billion.