Double suicide of Mikhail Maksimenko
Convicted ex-head of the Investigative Committee’s own security department Mikhail Maksimenko found dead. His former lawyer told Business FM about this. Maksimenko was serving a 14-year sentence in a case of two bribes and abuse of power. The sentence of the former investigator was part of a chain of related cases surrounding the high-profile trial against Shakro Molodoy.
Mikhail MaksimenkoThe body of the 50-year-old former head of the Investigative Committee’s own security department, according to a RBC source, found in one of the premises of a psychiatric hospital. Mikhail Maksimenko was sent there after a suicide attempt. He was found on the night from Monday to Tuesday; according to the preliminary version, it was another suicide attempt.
The body of Mikhail Maksimenko, hanged by shoelaces, according to preliminary data, was discovered by one of the prisoners in the storage room of the hospital’s psychiatric ward. He immediately reported the emergency to the colony administration staff, who, in turn, called doctors. However, doctors could only confirm the death of the convict.
It can be noted that during his stay in Lefortovo, Mikhail Maksimenko complained about the conditions of detention and the pressure put on him.
The former investigator was sentenced five years ago – he was accused in a case of bribery and abuse of power, on a combination of charges he was sentenced to 14 years in prison and a fine of 250 million rubles, and at the same time was stripped of the rank of colonel of justice.
The news background around Maksimenko was not very favorable, but his death was still unexpected, says his former lawyer Andrei Grivtsov. Business FM court observer Maria Lokotetskaya spoke with him:
“Unfortunately, I only know that such a death actually took place; I don’t know any more details.” He served his sentence in a colony, this is a colony in the Nizhny Novgorod region. I don’t know the details of how and why this happened.
– Did you know from his relatives?
– Yes, his wife confirmed it to me.
— When was the last time you had contact with him?
“I talked to him, probably, about a month or two ago, he called occasionally. He had the opportunity to make calls using a card; he mostly spent these calls on calls to his family, but sometimes he called me. About a month ago he didn’t say anything that he wasn’t feeling well, but in general he rarely complained, he was a fairly courageous and reserved person.
– But he didn’t have any problems with other convicts?
“I don’t know anything about such problems, as far as I heard, the attitude towards him was respectful, and I didn’t hear about any conflicts or problems.
At the same time as Mikhail Maksimenko, there were other high-ranking employees of the Investigative Committee in the dock: Alexander Lamonov, Denis Nikandrov, Alexander Drymanov And Alexey Kramarenko. They received from five to 12 years, only Kramarenko, according to RBC sources, recently received a pardon and is taking part in the SVO. Maksimenko was convicted of accepting bribes, including from crime boss Zakhary Kalashov, better known as Shakro Molodoy. For example, the court found that Maksimenko received 500 thousand dollars for assistance in the release of a defendant from a pre-trial detention center cases of shootout on Rochdelskaya street
Andrey Kochuykov.
Although Maksimenko never admitted guilt.
There was a story about another bribe – the investigation believed that Maksimenko received 50 thousand dollars from a St. Petersburg businessman Badri Shengelia for initiating a criminal case against employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs who seized Hublot watches from Shengelia.
There were a lot of similar details in the Maksimenko case. Stories surfaced in the media about how the FSB wiretapped conversations in an investigator’s office using bug hidden in the samovar. The FSB gave him this samovar. Or the story of how Maksimenko and Nikandrov discussed plans to introduce their man into the FSB structure, sitting in a strip club, and got into a fight with the security there over one pretty dancer. And investigators could simply prop up the closet with folders with important cases. Behind all this tinsel, the personality of Maksimenko himself was somehow lost, and if you take it apart, it becomes clear that the version of suicide became a priority for a reason, says Evgeniy Vyshenkov, deputy editor-in-chief of the Fontanka publication:
Deputy Editor-in-Chief of the Fontanka publication
“This is the person who supervises, who is the watchman over all the investigators. Any appeal he makes to the leaders of the regional investigative committees is very important. Therefore, he had enormous influence. If we were talking “down the street,” he would resolve the issues. Probably, the happiness and fate of this person and the life of this person was that he was powerful. But at the same time, he could drink simple vodka in restaurants. In a certain world, and this is not the world of investigators, but the world of government officials and serious businessmen, the surname Maksimenko is important. It just so happened that he ended up where he ended up. For people like this, who live such a life, live with this influence, live with their own ideas, decide the fate of people, falling outside a certain perimeter is a disaster.”
Now in the maximum security correctional colony in the city of Bor, in a special colony for security forces, where Mikhail Maksimenko was transferred in 2020, an inspection is underway. According to an RBC source close to the FSIN, it is “conducted by employees of the central office of the service, with the participation of investigators from the Investigative Committee and employees of the prosecutor’s office unit for supervision of the legality of the execution of criminal penalties.”
On October 17, 2016, Colonel Maksimenko was transferred to a hospital, but not a civilian one, but a prison one, and to a psychiatric hospital (on the territory of Butyrka). Experts expressed the opinion that psychotropic drugs were indeed used on Maksimenko, and he began to have a strong reaction to them (due to concussions).
All the last years spent in Lefortovo, Maksimenko looked very depressed, asked to be given a cellmate (he was sitting alone). But at the same time, in fact, every time he tried to convey that he would fight again, that is, he would definitely not commit suicide.
The Cheka-OGPU publishes the testimony of the former head of the Internal Security Service, Mikhail Maksimenko, which is given in the verdict handed down to him. His body was discovered in IK-9, Maksimenko died under very strange circumstances. He was an orderly in the medical unit. This is an extremely safe and “criminal” place for a prisoner. He was “shown” to replace the remaining sentence with correctional labor, and hearings were underway. The administration of the IC gave positive characteristics. True, on November 20 he was given a reprimand, which made Maksimenko despondent. He talked on the phone with his wife and son and went on duty. And then they found him elevated. Sources say that Maksimenko was a “man with a core” and would not “suicide” himself. Moreover, there were no compelling reasons for this.
