In the Meshchansky Court of Moscow, during the debate of the parties in the case of especially large-scale fraud in the supply of computer equipment for the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the state prosecution requested time for the defendants. The former head of the communications department of the department of information technology, communications and information protection of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs, Alexander Aleksandrov, faces 10 years in prison and a fine of 1.5 million rubles, as well as deprivation of the rank of colonel. For the founder of T-Platforms, Vsevolod Opanasenko, the prosecutor’s office demands 9 years in prison and a fine of 1 million rubles, and for the head of one of the departments of the Voronezh University of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Oksana Bokova, 4 years and a 70,000th fine with deprivation of the rank of lieutenant colonel.
The terms requested by the prosecutor’s office during the debate on the criminal case on especially large-scale fraud (part 4 of article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) were reported in the Meshchansky Court of the capital.
“The prosecutor, during a speech in the debate of the parties, demanded that Opanasenko be sentenced to nine years in a penal colony with a fine of 1 million rubles,” they said. The prosecutor demanded that Oksana Bokova be sentenced to four years in a penal colony and a fine of 70,000 rubles, as well as to be stripped of her rank of “police lieutenant colonel.”
The most severe punishment – ten years in prison, a fine of 1.5 million and deprivation of the title of “colonel of the internal service” threatens the ex-head of the communications department of the department of information technology, communications and information protection of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs Alexander Alexandrov.
As Kommersant said earlier, the Investigative Committee of Russia opened a criminal case in March 2019. Investigators were interested in a contract for 357 million rubles, concluded between the Ministry of Internal Affairs and T-Platforms JSC in November 2016.
According to the contract, the ministry was to receive 9348 automated workstations (AWP) on Baikal-T1 processors.
The technique was planned to be used, in particular, for conducting theoretical exams for the right to drive a car as part of the Federal Information System of the Traffic Police. The contractor’s website stated that “hundreds of thousands of Russian citizens will annually take driver’s license exams using the Tavolga Terminal workstation, thus this project will contribute to the promotion of domestic radio-electronic and microelectronic products in the civilian segment.”
The package should have included a terminal with a Russian processor, a monitor, a keyboard and a mouse. It was planned to equip the police units of Moscow, St. Petersburg, Yekaterinburg, Samara, Novosibirsk, Irkutsk, Khabarovsk and Rostov-on-Don with new equipment.
However, according to the investigation, in August 2017, when the contract expired, the automated workplaces were not delivered to the Ministry of Internal Affairs.
Shortly thereafter, the ministry accepted 1,837 computers worth 71 million rubles from the contractor, but refused to accept the rest of the equipment from the Ministry of Internal Affairs, citing a delay in delivery.
First, the defendants were charged with abuse of power and incitement to them, but then it was reclassified as fraud.
Vsevolod Opanasenko was supported by Boris Titov, Commissioner for the Protection of Entrepreneurs’ Rights under the President of Russia, who sent an appeal to Vladimir Putin. The business ombudsman expressed doubts both about the qualification of the actions of the defendants and about the conclusions of the examination carried out within the framework of the case.