Tushinsky district court of Moscow limited to suspended sentences for former leaders FSBI “Morspasluzhba” of Rosmorrechflot Andrey Khaustov and Dmitry Smirnov, as well as the Deputy General Director of the Kaliningrad LLC “Ecofreight” Evgeny Ponomarev. As it was established in court, in 2014-2015, the leaders of the rescue service entered into a fictitious container lease agreement with Ecofreight, and 30 million rubles transferred to the company. cashed out and taken.
The criminal case on the fact of fraud was initiated back in November 2018, and its current defendants first passed through it as witnesses. But in June 2020, the North-Western Investigation Department for Transport of the ICR, which was investigating the case, filed a charge of committing a particularly large-scale fraud (part 4 of article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) at first Mr. Khaustov, and shortly after that, Dmitry Smirnov, who led the Marine Rescue Service in 2013–2014 (he was replaced in his position by Andrey Khaustov), and Evgeny Ponomarev, Deputy General Director of the Kaliningrad company Ecofreight. Separately, Mr. Smirnov was also charged with exceeding official powers, “which resulted in a significant violation of the rights and legitimate interests of organizations or the interests of the state” (part 1 of article 286 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation).
FSBI “Morspasluzhba” is subordinated to Rosmorrechflot and is under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Transport of the Russian Federation. The subject of activity of the FGBU, according to the website of the organization, is rescue and search and rescue support in the field of maritime activities. The “Morspasluzhba” includes nine branches distributed over the sea basins.
It should be noted that in the course of the investigation, searches were carried out at the defendants, as well as at the Federal Agency for Maritime and River Transport, the Maritime Rescue Service and a number of commercial organizations. As Kommersant told, more than 100 million rubles were seized from Mr. Khaustov. in Russian and foreign currency, documents for foreign real estate and antiques, in particular, a collection of gold coins of historical value.
The Investigative Committee established that the fraud was committed in 2014-2015. Then, according to the materials of the case, “Morspasluzhba” entered into a fictitious contract with Yevgeny Ponomarev’s company “Ecofreight” for the lease of cargo containers.
30 million rubles were transferred to the account of the company, but, as the investigation considered, it was not going to fulfill its duties. Instead, according to the TFR, the participants in the criminal scheme cashed out and embezzled.
Despite the serious accusation, they did not take the defendants into custody, limiting themselves to undertaking not to leave. As a result, Mr. Khaustov headed the Marine Rescue Service until November 2021, when the investigation of the criminal case was completed.
The first hearings on the case were held on the eve of the new year, 2022, and the process continued until the beginning of June this year. It is worth noting that the defendants did not plead guilty – they argued that the contract was absolutely real and there could be no question of any misappropriation of millions of dollars.
In the debate, the representative of the prosecutor’s office asked to sentence the ex-officials and the entrepreneur to real terms of imprisonment – from three to four years in a general regime colony. The prosecutor also proposed to fine the defendants for amounts up to 1 million rubles. and oblige them to pay jointly and severally to the injured party – “Morspasluzhba” – 30 million rubles. Lawyers asked the defendants to acquit.
At the announcement of the verdict, the defendants appeared with large sports bags with things. It was noticeable that they were by no means optimistic. However, the presiding judge Elena Orlova, by her decision, improved their mood by imposing suspended sentences.
According to the verdict, all the defendants were found guilty of particularly large-scale fraud, while Dmitry Smirnov was acquitted of the charge of abuse of office due to the statute of limitations. As a result, Mr. Smirnov received three years probation, Evgeny Ponomarev – two and a half years, Andrey Khaustov – two years. At the same time, the court ordered each convict to pay 700 thousand rubles. fine, as well as reimburse 30 million rubles. the injured party.
The convicts and their defenders categorically refused to comment.
