Family war for Burlakov’s inheritance
The widow of billionaire Oleg Burlakov, who died of coronavirus in June 2021, filed a lawsuit against Vera Kazakova (the sister of the deceased) and her husband Nikolai Kazakov in the Petrogradsky District Court of St. Petersburg.
The plaintiff demands 800 million rubles from them for her husband’s 80% share in Social Housing LLC. According to some reports, in 2019 the company was sold for 1 billion rubles to Tyumen businessman Viktor Belichenko.
According to Ms. Burlakova’s defense, in 2017-2019, when his wife Lyudmila initiated a divorce proceeding in Monaco, and a dispute over the division of property was just around the corner, Oleg Burlakov, not without the help of his relative Nikolai Kazakov, made a number of sly transactions in order to withdraw the LLC “Social housing” from the family property.
“Social housing”, liquidated in August 2020, had at its disposal 408 thousand m2 of land in Tyumen for the construction of apartment buildings. According to experts, about 100 thousand m2 of real estate can be built here.
Taking into account the date of transactions for the alienation of shares, it can be assumed that the limitation period has passed, and missing the deadline is the basis for dismissing the claim. Obviously, in order to defend against the stated claim, it would be enough for the Kazakovs to bring to the court documents confirming compliance with the requirements of the law when they were made, including the necessary consent of the spouse to alienate the family asset, but the opponents chose the strategy of dragging out the dispute. Apparently, they are playing on middle-aged nerves …
The inheritance war began the very next day after the death of a businessman. Managers of his assets and property began to receive letters and notifications from credit institutions regarding the inheritance. At the same time, an information campaign was launched in Telegram and the media against Oleg Burlakov, his sister Vera and the family of his business partner Nikolai Kazakov.
Lawyers for Mrs. Burlakova all the time emphasized the status of the “lawful wife” of a billionaire, calling the widow and daughters of the deceased his family. However, over the past three years, Oleg Burlakov’s communication with his wife and daughters, who never visited him in the hospital, was carried out only through lawyers. Moreover, the will of the deceased was found, written in Monaco by hand without recourse to notaries, in which he left all his property to his sister and her husband, and did not even mention the so-called family in the will.
Oleg Burlakov, with a fortune of $650 million (2021 rating), was a co-owner of Stroylesbank, the Terpentin paint and varnish factory, and the Impulse investment and construction company. He owned the Black Pearl sailing yacht, 106.7 meters long.