Mobile arrest

The head of the Euroset security service was taken into custody

The Basmanny District Court of Moscow yesterday issued a warrant for the arrest of another Euroset top manager. The vice-president of the company, Boris Levin, and the deputy head of the security service, Andrei Ermilov, are already in custody on charges of kidnapping their colleague. Now, on the same charge, an exceptional measure of restraint has been imposed on the head of this service himself, Sergei Katargin. Like his colleagues, he does not admit his guilt, claiming that he did not commit any crimes and did not kidnap anyone.

As the Vremya Novostey newspaper has already described in detail , the scandal surrounding Euroset initially broke out two years ago, when company employees were suspected of smuggling mobile phones. However, the Moscow prosecutor's office, which investigated the case, did not confirm the fact of smuggling. Moreover, several law enforcement officers were suspected of falsifying evidence, exceeding official authority, and stealing company goods. Some of them have already been convicted, some are still wanted.

At the beginning of September this year, the UPC suddenly became interested in this case again. However, as it turned out, this had nothing to do with smuggling. The investigators' attention was drawn to the former Euroset freight forwarder Andrei Vlaskin. He said that in 2003, his superiors accused him of stealing a large consignment of mobile phones worth over 20 million rubles. and filed a complaint with law enforcement agencies. The forwarder escaped, but before the police, company security officers found him, brought him to Moscow and forced him to pay for the damage. Now Mr. Vlaskin himself complained to investigators that five years ago his former colleagues kidnapped him and extorted money.

It was for this that Messrs. were arrested in early September. Levin and Ermilov, and yesterday - Katargin.

The owner of Euroset, Evgeny Chichvarkin, was questioned on September 8 as a witness. According to his lawyer Yuri Gervis, it was not about the unfortunate forwarder - investigators were interested in the mechanisms of supply of mobile phones to Euroset in connection with an old smuggling case.

Exactly a week ago, on September 23, it became known that the investment company ANN of entrepreneur Alexander Mamut acquired 100% of the shares of Euroset. According to unofficial data, Mr. Mamut will pay about $400 million for Euroset, excluding debt, which is approximately $850 million.

Ekaterina BUTORINA