Tikhonov case

Yesterday, the prosecutor's office of the Ivanovo region announced the resumption of proceedings in the criminal case of the former governor of the region, Vladimir Tikhonov. If earlier the official was suspected of receiving a bribe, now he is also accused of illegal storage of ammunition. Mr. Tikhonov does not consider himself guilty, linking the criminal prosecution with the fact that influential enemies decided to prevent him from returning to government service.

The resumption of proceedings in the criminal case of ex-governor Tikhonov was announced on Monday by the head of the press service of the Ivanovo Regional Prosecutor's Office, Alexander Kopytov, who noted that if previously the official was charged with only one article of the Criminal Code, now - two.

Vladimir Tikhonov was first brought to criminal responsibility in December last year. At that time he was still acting as governor, although the regional legislative assembly had already approved Mikhail Me in this position. Thus, two governors appeared in the Ivanovo region at once. Vladimir Tikhonov announced that he would certainly serve in the chair until the expiration of the term - December 31, but after that he voluntarily resigned. Officially, this was explained by the fact that Mr. Tikhonov had health problems: he slipped, fell and injured his back. However, it later became known that the regional prosecutor's office opened a criminal case against him under Art. 290 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation ("Taking a bribe"). The governor was charged with receiving 50 thousand rubles. from entrepreneur Telman Feroyan. It is interesting that just a month before, the regional prosecutor’s office, after a thorough investigation, did not initiate a criminal case, being satisfied with the explanation that Mr. Tikhonov took money for charitable purposes. In May of this year, the prosecutor's office closed the case "for lack of corpus delicti" and sent the resolution to the Prosecutor General's Office for approval. There it was declared illegal and cancelled.

Vladimir Tikhonov himself stated that “the criminal case is the machinations of his political opponents,” who decided in this way to prevent his employment in government bodies. According to some reports, Mr. Tikhonov, who graduated from the Diplomatic Service Academy, expects to receive the post of ambassador to one of the European countries. “They want to achieve my complete elimination from the political arena and try to finish me off as a person. This is impossible to do. Nothing can finish me off,” said the ex-governor. However, he did not explain who he meant by “they”.

Vladimir Tikhonov’s lawyer Oleg Bibik also believes that another criminal case against his client could interfere with his future government service. “No investigative actions are being taken against Tikhonov,” says defense attorney Bibik. “And the charge of storing cartridges cannot be reasonably explained at all. Tikhonov had a service pistol, some of the cartridges were left over from shooting practice, and he explained all this during interrogation.”

LYUDMILA Kommersant-GUSEVA, Ivanovo

Ammunition was added to the case of the former governor