Translated material
The victim will become the defendant
The investigation into the Euroset case is completed
The Investigative Committee of the Prosecutor's Office (SKP), as Vremya Novostei learned, has completed an investigation into the scandalous criminal case against the former owner of the Euroset company Evgeny Chichvarkin ( pictured ) and seven of his subordinates - the company's vice president Boris Levin, the deputy head of the service security (SB) Andrei Ermilov, head of the economic security department Sergei Katorgin, SB employees Vitaly Tsverkunov, Alexander Olesik, Roman Chichkov and Vladimir Ilyin. According to investigators, they are all involved in the kidnapping of two freight forwarders from the Iled M company (a subsidiary of Euroset), Andrei Vlaskin and Dmitry Smurgin, that occurred six years ago. It is noteworthy that Vlaskin, who is considered a victim in this investigation, may soon also find himself in the dock. As it turned out, two cases were filed against him - the theft of a large batch of phones from Euroset and the attempted murder of one of the company's employees.Soon, as expected, Mr. Chichvarkin’s subordinates and their lawyers will begin familiarizing themselves with the investigation materials. The former head of the company himself has been in London since December, from where he has long stated through his lawyers that he does not yet intend to return to his homeland.
The investigation into the employees of the Security Service of Euroset, which ultimately resulted in an international wanted list for Mr. Chichvarkin, was launched by the Investigative Committee at the end of August last year, when investigators received a statement from former freight forwarder Dmitry Smurgin. He said that in 2003, an employee of the Euroset accounting department, Dmitry Kanunnikov, caught another forwarder from the Iled M company, Andrei Vlaskin, of stealing a shipment of mobile phones worth 20 million rubles. Then the management of Euroset turned to the Department of Internal Affairs of the Southern Administrative District (SAD) with a statement, which opened a case of theft against Vlaskin.
Vlaskin initially hid from the investigation, but soon employees of the Euroset Security Service and the Internal Affairs Directorate of the Southern Administrative District of Moscow, under the leadership of Messrs. Levin and Ermilov, found him in his native Tambov, took him to Moscow, where they kept him in rented apartments for some time. There the fugitive was convinced that it was in his interests to compensate the company for the damage. As a result, having sold the cars and an unfinished cottage in the Moscow region, the forwarder returned a total of more than 10 million rubles, and Euroset wrote a statement to the police that it no longer had any claims against Vlaskin.
Along the way, as follows from Smurgin’s statement, in 2003, Mr. Levin’s people kidnapped him, demanding the return of 20 thousand dollars, which he received from Vlaskin for silence, since he knew about the latter’s machinations. After Smurgin also returned part of the money - $10.3 thousand, he was released, and he continued to work at Iled M for a long time until he quit of his own free will. Why Smurgin did not contact law enforcement immediately after the abduction, but did so only five years later, he could not explain to the investigation. However, Smurgin was immediately taken under state protection, with 24-hour security assigned to him.
On September 2 last year, based on Smurgin’s statement, the Investigative Committee opened a criminal case of kidnapping, extortion and arbitrariness against Euroset top managers Levin and Ermilov and SB employees Katorgin and Tsverkunov. On the same day, employees of the Investigative Committee and the Department “K” of the Ministry of Internal Affairs conducted searches at the central office of Euroset. In Mr. Levin’s office, investigators found a folder with materials on Vlaskin. It was added to the materials of the criminal case, and, although no handwriting examination was carried out, it became the main reason for the arrest of all four.
A little later in the case, a statement appeared from Vlaskin himself, who confirmed the words of his colleague that in 2003 he was indeed kidnapped by employees of the Euroset Security Service. He was kept in handcuffs in rented apartments in Moscow and the Moscow region, the rent of which was paid by Euroset, and he was allegedly guarded by SB officer Vitaly Tsverkunov, who periodically beat him. Vlaskin, according to the SKP, remained in captivity for several days, agreed to give up money and property worth 10 million rubles, after which he managed to escape.
Already at the beginning of this year, the list of defendants in the case was supplemented by three more employees of the Euroset Security Service - Olesik, Chichkov and Ilyin. After the first searches and the arrest of their superiors, they went on the run, but were later found and interrogated, after which they were also charged. All of them were chosen as a preventive measure in the form of a written undertaking not to leave the place, but Vladimir Ilyin again absconded from the investigation, and he was put on the wanted list.
Also, as part of the investigation of this case, former and current employees of the Internal Affairs Directorate of the Southern Administrative District of Moscow were questioned as witnesses. In February, SKP officers arrived at the Internal Affairs Directorate to seize a number of documents and the computer of the investigator who opened a case against Vlaskin in 2003. On the spot, it turned out that some of the materials on Vlaskin, according to the SKP, were allegedly hastily thrown into a garbage container and police officers allegedly tried to prevent them from being taken from there. Regarding this fact, the former head of the Internal Affairs Directorate of the Southern Administrative District, Viktor Ageev, and the head of the investigation department of the Internal Affairs Directorate, Alexander Kudryashov, were summoned for questioning. In addition, other police officers were interrogated.
Among them was the former detective officer of the 1st department of the 4th operational-search unit under the criminal investigation department, Alexander Kurta, who several years ago was convicted of abuse of power and was recently released from prison. The latter allegedly told investigators that in 2003 he provided operational support in the Vlaskin case. When employees of the Euroset Security Service established that Vlaskin was hiding in Tambov, he went there with them and brought the forwarder to Moscow to a rented apartment, where he helped “knock out” the debt from Vlaskin. According to the Vremya Novostei source, it was Kurta and his other former colleagues who testified during the investigation that the organizer of these crimes was the co-founder of Iled-M LLC, Cellular Communications Exhibition LLC and Euroset Trade House LLC Evgeniy Chichvarkin himself.
As follows from the case materials, this is the only testimony that indicates Mr. Chichvarkin’s involvement in the kidnapping of freight forwarders. The victims themselves and his former subordinates, as far as is known, never stated that the businessman took part in the crime or knew about it.
In September-November 2008, Mr. Chichvarkin was invited several times to the UPC to give evidence, but in December he left for London. The investigation immediately decided that he was hiding in this way, having actually admitted his guilt, and at the beginning of this year he was charged in absentia and put on the international wanted list.
So far, according to our source, the investigation has not decided whether the case will be sent to court against all defendants at once (in this case, those absent will be tried in absentia) or whether the materials on Mr. Chichvarkin will be separated into separate proceedings. But it is already known that the defendants in custody intend to demand a trial by jury.
Also, the issue of the fate of the money that, after the theft, the stolen forwarders were forced to pay to the Security Service employees, has not yet been formally resolved. Initially, the investigation believed that the accused divided them up and spent them on their personal needs. But on February 25 of this year, during another seizure at the Euroset office on 2nd Yuzhnoportovy Proezd, UPC investigators seized materials from the Management Accounting databases for 2003-2004. It followed from them that the phones stolen by forwarder Vlaskin in 2003 were sold through Euroset trade pavilions, but in the end they were not counted as sold. And after Vlaskin and Smurgin returned the money, they were handed over to the accounting department and credited to the company’s accounts. Alexander Romanov, senior investigator for particularly important cases of the SKP, added these documents to the case materials. But it is not yet clear what position the prosecution will take at trial.
During the investigation of this case, Mr. Romanov, according to our source, also accepted two more criminal cases, in which Vlaskin himself is accused. One of them concerns the very theft of Euroset phones, and the second concerns attempts on the life of Dmitry Kanunnikov, an employee of the Euroset accounting department. Regarding the theft of phones, the investigation cannot yet determine the amount of damage, but the defense insists that there are now documents that show how much money passed through the company’s cash register. This is the amount they are asking to impute to Vlaskin.
Regarding the investigation into the attacks on Mr. Kanunnikov, according to our source, Vlaskin has already confessed. He testified that immediately after Mr. Kanunnikov caught him stealing, he harbored a grudge and decided to take revenge. To achieve this, Vlaskin allegedly agreed with persons unidentified by the investigation. The first time, a tripwire grenade was placed near Kanunnikov’s apartment, but his wife discovered it and the bomb was defused. The second time, unknown persons ambushed Mr. Kanunnikov and stabbed him several times, but he survived. Based on these facts, a case of attempted murder was opened. According to reports, his investigation is also almost complete, and Vlaskin has already been charged, although he has not been arrested.