A billionaire living in France was accused of destroying a historic building in the center of Kazan

An official defendant has appeared in a criminal case on unrestored historical mansions in the center of Kazan – he is the owner of the ASG investment group Alexey Semin, which is now, among other things, put on the federal and interstate wanted list. On Friday evening, the “economic” department of the TFR made a futile attempt to arrest the landlord. At the same time, the calculation of damages in the case and the interrogation of the spiteful critics of the billionaire continue. Thus, the anniversary of the investigation is gradually approaching. Semin, who lives in France, acquires an alibi – they say that he did not put any signatures, everything was done by the managers. Details of the investigation and the strangeness of the case – in the material “BUSINESS Online”.

Investigative committee charged Semin

Aleksey Semin, a billionaire living in France, was put on the interstate wanted list. This became known towards the close of last week, when the investigation unexpectedly turned to the Privolzhsky District Court with a request to arrest the well-known Kazan rentier.

The corresponding petition was submitted to the court by the investigator for especially important cases of the fourth department (specializing in crimes in the economic sphere) of the Investigative Committee for the Republic of Tatarstan Yulia Munina. For Semin, this situation is deja vu. In 2015, he was arrested in absentia after a fire in the Admiral shopping center. However, later the case was closed and there were no claims against the billionaire.

Investigator Munina, according to the sources of our publication, said in court that on June 27, Semin was charged with a crime under Part 1 of Art. 243 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (“Destruction or damage to cultural heritage sites”).

We are talking about a criminal case, about which in detail wrote “BUSINESS Online” even at the end of last year. Two of the many cultural objects of the center of Kazan, inherited by ASG during the program of privatization of historical heritage before the Universiade-2013, pass along it – this is the building of the Admiralty office complex (K. ). According to the public-private partnership agreement, Semin had to restore the facilities and bring them into proper condition. But in the course of the work, according to investigators, something went wrong. “Objects of the external and internal appearance of cultural heritage objects have been lost, and the existence of facts of destruction of cultural heritage objects previously transferred to the property in violation of security obligations has been established,” the Investigative Committee said in one of its petitions for the arrest of the landlord’s property. Claims about the quality of the restoration resulted in a criminal case against unidentified employees of LLC “MC Capital-Trust-Invest” controlled by Semin and the closed-end mutual investment fund “AS – Construction Fund”. The case was opened on August 31, 2021, and its investigation is now in its 11th month. Recently, the term of the preliminary investigation was once again extended for another month, that is, until July 30th.

According to the documents submitted to the court, his defenders from the A2K law office were notified of the charges against Semin (so far only in the building at 17 K. Marx Street). Landlord was ordered on July 1 to appear at the department for investigative actions as an accused. But Leveville, permanently residing in his castle in the Loire Valley, did not respond to the request of the investigator. Instead, lawyer Sergei Mukhanov came to the department, who, however, could not explain where his client was. As a result, the investigation concluded that Semin was hiding. And the TFR had no choice but to put him on the wanted list: first – to the federal, then – to the interstate. According to the Rozysk-Magistral police base, the last time Semin’s traces were recorded during his flight on May 18 on a Dubai-Paris flight.

Munina, having also enlisted the support of the prosecutor Diana Nigmatullina, asked the court to choose Semin’s arrest in absentia for a period of 2 months. According to her, Semin’s guilt in the alleged crime is confirmed both by the materials of the case and by the testimony of witnesses. Among the latter, the investigator noted, a certain former employee of Capital-Trust-Invest Vladimir Sinitsyn, ASG manager Robert Khairullin, well-known after the tragedy with the Admiral, and also the former Deputy Minister of Culture of the Republic of Tatarstan Svetlana Persova. By the way, back in the spring of 2012, she accused Semin of violations during the restoration work at the transferred objects, which led, in particular, to the loss of decorative elements of the facades and damage to the building structure.

The ICR has already asked to arrest Semin’s accounts, and the defense insists on the alibi of his client

Marat Mukhtarov, the lawyer representing Semin’s interests at this trial, did not agree with the position of the investigator who asked for the arrest. The defender brought a whole package of counterarguments. Firstly, our sources report, Mukhtarov pointed out that the damage has not yet been established in the criminal case on the disputed objects, just as it is still unclear how exactly the historical buildings were damaged. In his separate petition, the lawyer reminded that on several occasions the courts, with similar, but administrative claims, had already issued denials to bring Kapital-Trust-Invest to liability, without finding the corpus delicti. When the Volga Court refused to seize Semin’s accounts on June 23, Mukhtarov recalled, the investigator stated that there were no victims, suspects, defendants, a civil lawsuit in the case, that Semin’s role was still being established, that the necessary examinations had not yet been carried out.

Secondly, Mukhtarov said, Semin has an alibi. When, on May 16, 2013, Capital-Trust-Invest concluded a contract with ZAO Grid Company Energotechnika at the Admiralty Office, Semin did not put his signature – at that time he was not in the country. And since he did not make decisions on the restoration of the object, then there should not be demand from him. At the very least, the lawyer said in court, shareholders by law cannot be held liable for the actions of the management company.

The third point, which the defense lawyer drew attention to, is related to the non-compliance by the investigation with the established procedure for filing charges in absentia. For example, the investigator is well aware that Semin is registered in Moscow. But at the place of registration, there were no notifications of charges being brought against him. Moreover, Mukhtarov noted that when his colleague Mukhanov came to the department on July 1 instead of his client, he was allegedly refused a request to even get acquainted with the decision to bring Semin as a defendant, which is a gross violation of the Code of Criminal Procedure. Not to mention the fact that the decision to put Semin on the interstate or international wanted list was not sewn into the case file filed with the court on Friday. And this is perhaps the most delicate detail: it was on the basis of the search documents that Semin was asked to be sent under arrest in absentia. That is, investigator Munina decided not to take the main document to court for some reason …

Based on this and a number of other arguments, Mukhtarov asked the court to refuse Munina’s request for Semin’s arrest. Judge of the Volga Court Ramil Gayfutdinov, agreeing with the arguments of the defense, ultimately did just that – the investigation was denied the arrest of the billionaire.