At an off-site meeting of the Lyubertsy City Court, held in the Moscow Regional Court, a debate began on the case of the former governor of the Khabarovsk Territory, Sergei Furgal, and his three alleged accomplices. They are accused of organizing and carrying out two contract killings and an attempt, committed in the early 2000s, as well as illegal arms and ammunition trafficking. Prosecutors asked the jury to find all four defendants guilty and not deserving of leniency.
It took prosecutors almost four hours to speak in the debate. At the same time, Sergei Furgal, accused of ordering crimes, his former assistant and alleged intermediary Andrei Karepov, the possible perpetrator of two murders, Andrei Paliy, and Marat Kadyrov, who, according to the investigation, had committed an unsuccessful attempt on Mr. Furgal’s business rival Alexander Smolsky, were in the hall, while the support group of the former Khabarovsk governor and journalists had to watch the meeting via video link.
First, prosecutor Alexander Korobeinikov spoke about the conflict between Sergei Furgal and Mr. Smolsky.
According to the state prosecutor, organized in the early 2000s by Mr. Furgal and his business partner Nikolai Mistryukov, MIF Khabarovsk LLC, like Mr. Smolsky’s company, was engaged in the collection and sale of scrap metal. But the latter was doing much better than the future governor, also because the company of Alexander Smolsky paid 30% more for scrap metal than the company of the future official, and therefore had more clients. This is what caused the discord between entrepreneurs. At first, according to the prosecution, Mr. Furgal persuaded the competitor to lower prices, later he began to threaten and, finally, decided that Mr. Smolsky should be eliminated. Andrey Karepov, connected, according to the investigation, with the criminal world of the region, undertook to help him. In particular, he was familiar with the local “authority” Mikhail Timofeev (put on the international wanted list), who headed a powerful “brigade” at the beginning of the 2000s. He suggested that his friend Marat Kadyrov be the perpetrator of the crime.
According to prosecutor Korobeinikov, on June 28, 2004, Marat Kadyrov ambushed Alexander Smolsky near the garage and threw grenades at him. The first exploded when the entrepreneur had already entered the garage, and therefore he was not injured. The second, which the killer threw at the victim’s feet, did not work – Marat Kadyrov could not pull the pin.
By the way, after the assassination attempt, the surviving entrepreneur nevertheless reduced the price to the level of Mr. Furgal’s company.
The next victim of Sergei Furgal, according to prosecutors, was the Khabarovsk businessman Yevgeny Zorya, who was killed on October 28, 2004.
According to the prosecutor, he was a man of principle: for example, he did not pay for the “roof” to either the bandits or the security forces. The reason for his dispute with Sergei Furgal was the main workshop of the bankrupt concrete products plant No. 2 with an area of 15 thousand square meters. m. In the summer of 2002, Mr. Zorya bought it for a million rubles, and Sergei Furgal, according to the investigation, decided to gradually seize the object. At first he began to sue, but Mr. Zorya won the cases. Then, according to the prosecution, in February 2003, with the help of the bankruptcy trustee, Sergei Furgal forged documents, on the basis of which the local arbitration in the fall of 2003 decided the issue in favor of Mr. Furgal. However, higher authorities canceled this decision, and the object remained with Mr. Zorya. Already in the summer of 2004, Yevgeny Zorya noticed that he was being followed, about which he wrote statements to all law enforcement agencies, claiming that he could become a victim of a contract killing. But this did not save him: according to the case file, on October 28, 19-year-old killer Andrei Paley, who was part of Mikhail Timofeev’s brigade, shot the entrepreneur at his house with a TT pistol, firing eight bullets at him.
The latest victim of Sergei Furgal, according to the investigation, was the director of West Marketing LLC Oleg Bulatov, who was engaged in the export of scrap metal abroad.
Mr. Bulatov, who previously served in the police, knew the members of Mikhail Timofeev’s “team” well, and when the search for the murder of Yevgeny Zori intensified (in the papers and computer of the deceased it was indicated that Sergey Furgal could “order” him), local investigators began to call various entrepreneurs and members of the “team” for interrogation. They also interrogated Mr. Bulatov. He said that he knew about the conflict between Mr. Zori and Andrei Karepov, who represented the interests of Furgal. As a result, in early February 2005, Mr. Bulatov was shot dead near his garage, and the killer finished off the businessman with four shots in the head, and then threw an RGD-5 grenade at him. The investigation considers Mr. Paley to be the perpetrator of this crime.
Sergei Furgal shared his version of criminal prosecution with Kommersant
After talking about the crimes and the roles that, according to investigators, the defendants played in them, the prosecutors asked the jurors to show “worldly wisdom.” In the opinion of the state prosecutors, the guilt of the defendants in the case has been proven in court and the latter do not deserve leniency.
The defendants’ lawyers are scheduled to speak on Wednesday.