The criminal case against S7 Deputy General Director Boris Kamyshev, flight director Mansur Badrakov and lead instructor pilot Mikhail Gusev was sent to the Domodedovo City Court. They are accused of bribes and fraud totaling 1.85 million rubles. According to investigators, Kamyshev, Badrakov and Gusev received this money from pilot candidates. The case also involves a relative of one of the candidates, who is accused of giving a bribe.
The detention of S7 employees became known back in June 2021, they are under house arrest and suspended from work in the company or fired of their own free will. S7 stated that they are cooperating with the investigation in this case.
Sergei Matyushenkov, Managing Partner at BGMP Law Office, comments:
“The maximum punishment for commercial bribery is 12 years, the minimum is seven years. This is a commercial bribery on an especially large scale, if we focus on the figures given. If the same defendant has an article “fraud”, the punishment may be partially added: there is a term of up to ten years, if it is committed on an especially large scale, but there is not enough information. Most likely, given that the suspects were under house arrest all this time, it is hardly worth expecting a suspended sentence. Most likely, they will be given a real punishment, which, perhaps, will be partially offset against the served house arrest. I think that the airline itself will not do anything in connection with this case, as a result, they will have to write out a submission to prevent such cases. From the investigator, a letter will come to the airline stating that it is necessary to carry out preventive measures and explanatory work with employees in order to prevent such cases from happening in the future. If they wanted to involve someone else from the company’s management as part of this story, this person would probably have already appeared: the case is being investigated for a long time, which means that no other persons involved have been found.”
The prosecutor’s office of the Moscow region transferred the case to the Moscow court at the end of December. A preliminary hearing has been set for January 23.