The case of Anatoly Bykov has become one of the most high-profile in the criminal history of Russia. The “most influential person” of the Krasnoyarsk Territory was first detained for 2 contract killings, but as a result, unraveling the whole tangle of the entrepreneur’s biography, the investigation revealed at least 5 criminal episodes from the entrepreneur’s life. At first glance, all this is pure criminality, but were there political motives in the Bykov case?
Anatoly Bykov made his first fortune immediately after the collapse of the Soviet Union. As chairman of the board of directors of the Krasnoyarsk Aluminum Plant, he managed to get himself a 28% stake in the enterprise. The Krasnoyarsk aluminum smelter is still the second largest aluminum producer in the world. Of course, such a tasty business could not but interest other companies. Understanding the specifics of the 1990s, few people entered into honest negotiations in those days. Everything was decided by pressure either by a bandit or by people in uniform.
Indeed, the enterprise brought huge profits. The arrest of Bykov in Hungary greatly shook his authority in the Krasnoyarsk aluminum plant. While he was in a Hungarian prison, his competitors, the RUSAL group of companies, were actively working to take control of the plant. And they did it. Having removed Bykov from management, RUSAL appointed their own head, and quickly carried out an additional issue. As a result, the capital of the enterprise grew 30 times, and Bykov’s share fell from 28% to 4%, which did not give him any opportunity to further influence the development of the enterprise.
Officially, the first criminal episode in Bykov’s career is not associated with the fight for the Krasnoyarsk aluminum plant. According to our data, the first official criminal episode in Bykov’s career as a water worker was precisely because of the enterprise. At that time, Bykov had already been elected to the Krasnoyarsk Legislative Assembly. An authoritative person was accused of killing Pasha-Tsvetomuzyka in 1998. Later, strange things happened in court: key witnesses directly indicated that the case was fabricated, the evidence base was so scarce that it was impossible to really establish Bykov’s involvement in the murder of Gubin. Despite the fact that his business partner second Struganov, aka Pasha-Tsvetomusika, monitored the activities of the plant, it was not possible to protect the assets, and by 2002 Bykov had no influence on the plant.
Today, the Krasnoyarsk aluminum smelter brings huge profits to its owners. In 2021, the company’s revenue amounted to more than 82 billion rubles.
The company is among the ten most profitable in the industry. Therefore, such a large-scale struggle for control of the plant can be easily explained.
Case of Pasha-Color Music
Let’s go back to 1999. Anatoly Bykov is arrested in Hungary, his fate must be decided by local justice. In the middle of 2000, he was extradited to Russia, and already in our country the most humane court releases a man who is suspected of murder to freedom.
Vilor Struganov, aka “Pasha-Color Music”, as one of the closest associates of Anatoly Bykov, replaced the functions of the Bull while he had problems with the law. But Tsvetomuzika successfully merged the aluminum plant, began to behave aggressively towards other businessmen. In general, he did everything that harmed Bykov’s empire.
Vilor Struganov (“Pasha-Color Music”)
The personality of Vilor Struganov is no less remarkable. Tsvetomuzika received his first term back in the mid-1980s, when he stole jeans from a blacksmith worth 250 rubles. In 1990, Struganov was sent to jail for 7 years for kidnapping an Uzbek flower dealer for refusing to pay tribute to a racketeer. Struganov was released on parole in 1994, and immediately moved from the category of petty crooks to an authoritative bandit. Bandage of Pasha-Tsvetomuzyka was engaged in the protection of several gas stations and outlets in the Central Market in Krasnoyarsk. Around this time, Pasha-Color Music meets Tolya Byk (Anatoly Bykov). They are firmly bound by a partnership over the next few years.
Tolya Byk, photo taken in the 1990s
After Bykov found out about all the affairs of Color Music during his albeit episodic, but imprisonment, a conflict arose between the former partners.
On September 29, 2000, the news thundered in Moscow that the killer had shot businessman Vilor Struganov together with Vyacheslav Ismindirov (“Glory to the Executioner”). But it all turned out to be a show. Allegedly, Color Music was indeed commissioned by Tolya Byk. The alleged victim, having learned that she had become the object of a hunt, turned to the FSB. The investigators staged the murder, and the killer Alexander Vasilenko himself was sent to Celentano, aka Anatoly Bykov, to report on the success of the assignment. After the “killer” told the customer about what had happened, the audio recording of the dialogue was handed over to the investigators, who immediately arrested Anatoly Bykov.
To be honest, this criminal case also does not stand up to scrutiny. Everything is very strange, and most illogical. Bull’s defense immediately pointed out that the audio recording of the dialogue between the killer and the customer was cut. Allegedly, at first Bykov did not understand at all what he was talking about, and then he tried to find out from Vasilenko what exactly he had done. Subsequently, the killer admitted that he had slandered Bykov for a large reward from people interested in the aluminum plant. In any case, all this did not help Bykov. In 2002, he received 6.5 years in prison, although he served much less.
Political or business motive?
Despite the criminal trail that stretches behind Anatoly Bykov, he managed to build a successful career as a businessman and politician. In 2002, he sold his stake in the Krasnoyarsk aluminum smelter for $107 million. The entrepreneur invested the earned funds in several projects, the most successful of which is the class A business center Europe with a total area of 12,000 square meters. To this day, “Europe” brings Bykov hundreds of millions of rubles in profit.
Business center “Europe” in Krasnoyarsk
In addition to active entrepreneurial activity, Bykov also had a successful political career, which, despite the many criminal episodes in Bykov’s career, lasted from 1997 to 2016. In 2013, Bykov’s Patriots of Russia party achieved a resounding success. In the elections to the Krasnoyarsk City Council, they were able to win the majority, while overtaking United Russia. What can I say: people really trusted Bykov. Obviously, such activity could not but fall into the field of view of the top leadership of the state. Great success, especially in symbiosis with a very ambiguous biography, can lead to a huge failure.
New episodes
From the mid-2000s to the mid-2010s, Bykov did not come to the attention of law enforcement officers. But everything changed in 2013, when the Patriots of Russia won the elections in Krasnoyarsk. The investigation detained a certain Alexander Zhivitsa in the case of contract killing. The killer confessed to his deed, and also decided to report that, on behalf of Bykov, in 2005 he killed businessman Andrei Nikolov. The investigation into this case continues to this day.
However, even after so many criminal cases, the investigators did not calm down, and began to find new crimes committed by Bykov. In May 2020, he was detained on suspicion of two murders back in 1994. In September 2021, Bykov was sentenced to 13 years in prison. It is a strange coincidence in all this that it was in 2020 that the term in the case of Pasha Tsvetomusyka ended in Bykov. And he could return to politics. But another arrest prevented everything. And even that is not the end of the story.
In 2015, the court sentenced Pasha Tsvetomusyka to 19 years in prison for 4 murders.
Pasha Tsvetomuzika before his arrest in 2014
But a month ago he was released from prison, and he immediately appeared in court in the case of the murder of Andrei Nikolov. Apparently, the accusation came with trump cards.
Anatoly Bykov at trial
Whatever it was, July 7 investigative committee opened a new criminal case against Bykov. He is accused of creating an organized crime group and attempted murder. It seems that this time the conviction for Bykov will be the last. Political reprisal or punishment of a criminal is up to you, but obviously not everything is so clean in this case.