A well-known entrepreneur and his former company were confiscated almost 20 billion
As it became known to Kommersant, the claim of the Prosecutor General’s Office for almost 20 billion rubles was satisfied. to the former State Duma deputy from A Just Russia Sergei Petrov and the Rolf group of companies founded by him. The court, relying, among other things, on the materials that the supervision received from the FSB and Rosfinmonitoring, found that, being a people’s choice, Mr. Petrov continued to manage the activities of the country’s largest car dealer and received income on an especially large scale from “activities prohibited by anti-corruption legislation.” The defendants are going to appeal the decision, but it is already clear that Rolf will have to pay. The required amount is arrested on his accounts.
Proceedings in the Khimki city court on the claim filed by First Deputy Prosecutor General Anatoly Razinkin were short-lived. The court could have made a decision at the end of last year, but the supervisory authority clarified and increased their claims against the defendants from 12.85 billion rubles. up to 19.4 billion rubles.
As a result, the court found that, being a State Duma deputy and formally transferring the management of the company to his son Alexander, Sergey Petrov was actively involved in business from 2010 to 2016.
It was he who in 2010 became the guarantor for a loan of 12.6 billion rubles, which was taken by Rolf in Sberbank. The prosecutor’s office believes that in order to obtain a loan, Mr. Petrov negotiated with representatives of Sberbank, that is, he was engaged in entrepreneurial activities incompatible with the status of a State Duma deputy.
The Prosecutor General’s Office also learned from the FSB that in his free time from work in the State Duma, Sergei Petrov held meetings with the company’s management, gave him instructions and instructions, and also discussed the issues of “transferring assets abroad and creating new investment projects.”
So, for example, it was said in the lawsuit, from 2014 to 2016, Rolf transferred 8.9 billion rubles under the guise of dividends. to the accounts of Mr. Petrov and his family members through Panabel Ltd, Delance Ltd and Rolf Motors, whose beneficiaries, according to the supervisory data, they were.
The Prosecutor General’s Office, and after it the court, recognized the episode of 2014 as illegal activity of the deputy, when, through the Cyprus offshore Panabel Ltd, the Rolf group of companies (GC) acquired the shares of Rolf Estate CJSC. Thus, almost 4 billion rubles were withdrawn from the country, for which the State Corporation, according to the conclusions of experts from the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation, received 1,797 shares of CJSC worth only 1 ruble.
This episode also became the reason for the criminal prosecution of Mr. Petrov, who was charged in absentia by the ICR under Part 3 of Art. 193.1 (carrying out foreign exchange transactions for the transfer of funds in foreign currency or the currency of the Russian Federation to the accounts of non-residents using false documents) of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. The founder of Rolf himself was put on the international wanted list, but not extradited to Russia by Austria, whose citizenship he has. In the Cheryomushkinsky District Court of Moscow, only the case of the former top manager of Rolf Anatoly Kairo is being considered, who denies his guilt.
As follows from the materials of the suit, it was while supervising the investigation of this case that the Prosecutor General’s Office learned about the illegal business activities of Deputy Petrov.
Subsequently, the supervisory claims were increased. According to the Prosecutor General’s Office, which was recognized by the court, in the period from 2012 to 2016, Rolf LLC transferred 9.3 billion rubles to Panabel Ltd, Delance Ltd and Rolf Motors controlled by Mr. Petrov, in turn, the latter transferred 983 million rubles. to the same Cypriot offshores. In 2015, Rolf Estate St. Petersburg LLC transferred about 733 million rubles to the accounts of Delance Ltd. Thus, Mr. Petrov received more than 11 billion rubles through controlled companies, established supervision and a court. These payments, the plaintiff believes, were illegal, since during this period the defendant was prohibited from doing business.
Meanwhile, according to supervisory data, Sergey Petrov legalized 4.4 billion rubles through another Cypriot company under his control, Colgrade Limited, which he sent to Rolf LLC through fictitious transactions. According to the prosecutor’s office, the company accepted the funds transferred by Mr. Petrov and “illegally involved” them in its business.
On Wednesday, the Khimki District Court, as a law enforcement source told Kommersant, fully satisfied the claim of the Prosecutor General’s Office, jointly and severally recovering 19 billion 435 million 425 thousand 885 rubles from Rolf Group and its founder Sergei Petrov. and 75 kop.
The company will be able to comment on the court decision after receiving the full text of the document, Svetlana Vinogradova, general director of Rolf, told Kommersant. “Cash in the amount of the amount of the claim is reserved in the company’s accounts. They can actually be collected only after the entry into force of the court decision,” she explained. At the same time, “a possible write-off of funds will not affect the operating activities of the Rolf company,” concludes Ms. Vinogradova: “The company is operating as usual, implementing the plans outlined earlier and fulfilling its obligations to customers and partners in full.”
At the same time, it should be recalled that Rolf is currently in the process of being sold to a smaller dealer, Auto Key.
To protect a well-known businessman, the court decision turned out to be unexpected. “We believe that there are no grounds or evidence of the claim in the case,” lawyer Alexei Kupriyanov told Kommersant. The court decision, the interlocutor of Kommersant noted, “actually introduces a new punishment – civil confiscation of the defendants’ funds for misconduct that are not crimes.” As for the possibility of paying the sum owed, then, according to Mr. Kupriyanov, she has already been arrested. If the Moscow Regional Court, to which the defendants apply to appeal against the decision of the city court, leaves it in force, almost 20 billion rubles. will be transferred to the budget of the Russian Federation.
