In early January, the Investigative Department of the Kanavinsky District Department of Internal Affairs of Nizhny Novgorod opened a criminal case under Part 4 of Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (“Fraud”) against a number of top managers of the Nizhny Novgorod branch of UniCredit Bank, the head of one of the insurance companies, and the organizer of one-day firms for cashing out money. This was reported by the head of the press service of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for the Volga Federal District, Vasily Kucherak. He did not name the companies or the names of the defendants in the case, citing the secrecy of the investigation, but added that the circle of fraudsters has been identified and the issue of a preventive measure for them is currently being decided.

The fraud was revealed by the internal control service and the economic security service of UniCredit Bank, Irina Bulygina, head of the media relations department of the bank's PR and media relations department, told Vedomosti. In October 2006, they conducted their own investigation into the employees of the Nizhny Novgorod branch and, having discovered abuses, passed the materials to the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia for the Volga Federal District.

From May to October 2006, fraudsters appropriated over 4 million rubles in the form of insurance premiums for car loans, Kucherak said.

Managers of a shell company that provided intermediary services to car buyers, arranging loans, significantly inflated their cost and the amount of their insurance, he explained. The insurance contracts, which were then transferred to the Nizhny Novgorod branch of UniCredit Bank, indicated an inflated insurance amount and insurance premium, while the real figures were indicated in the policy, which was not presented to the bank. The fraudsters pocketed the difference. In most cases, borrowers did not know about the inflated prices and, as a rule, purchased expensive foreign cars, losing an average of 500,000 rubles from each transaction. More than 200 such borrowers have been identified, Kucherak said. A number of managers of the bank branch have already been fired. Branch manager Sergei Salasov continues to perform his duties.

According to the Main Information Center of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation, the number of frauds in the banking sector is growing every year. If in 2003 87,471 such cases were registered in the banking sector, in 2004 – 126,047, then from January to August 2005 in Russia 117,449 frauds were detected, which is 36.5% higher than in the same period of 2004.

At the same time, there have been no registered precedents of fraud on car loans in the Volga Federal District, Kucherak said.

The credit and financial sector is one of the most crime-ridden in Russia today, says Vladimir Markov, head of the economic security department of the Nizhny Novgorod branch of Bank of Moscow. In 2006, Bank of Moscow's security service stopped the activities of a former department head of one of the branches, who is now facing criminal charges, Markov said, refusing to provide details.

Insurance companies also identify dishonest employees. In 2006, they were actively involved in checking employees in the regional branches of RESO-Garantiya. First, the director of the Smolensk branch, Nikolai Ermachkov, and the director of the Barnaul branch, Yuri Elistratov, were fired and convicted for abuses. In November, Viktor Kuropov, a lawyer for the Novosibirsk branch of RESO, was caught in fraud and fired.

Bankers stole more than 4 million rubles.