MOSCOW, December 27 (RIA Novosti) – A Moscow court on Friday reversed a lower court’s decision to arrest former senator and wealthy industrialist Sergei Pugachyov, citing procedural violations.
The lower court had ordered the arrest of the former lawmaker, who has reportedly fled the country, on large-scale embezzlement charges. Pugachyov’s lawyers have appealed the arrest order.
“The ruling was overturned due to procedural violations during the [lower court's] hearings of the case submitted by investigators,” Judge Larisa Polyakova said.
The case has been sent back for revision, she said.
Pugachyov’s lawyer Alexander Golfstein said his client had been unjustly labeled “a fugitive criminal,” although he was not hiding from authorities and was willing to cooperate with investigators if they stopped using “terrorist” methods in their attempts to question him.
The arrest warrant for Pugachyov, ousted from the parliament’s upper house in 2011, was issued last week in connection with an inquiry into the 2010 bankruptcy of his International Industrial Bank (Mezhprombank), according to sources cited by the Kommersant business daily.
Mezhprombank was declared bankrupt after failing to meet Central Bank requirements and repay creditors. The bank still owes creditors more than 80 billion rubles ($2.4 billion), Kommersant reported Thursday.
One source cited by the newspaper said Pugachyov might be suspected of organizing a large-scale fraud by issuing loans worth $900 million in Luxembourg to companies associated with the bank. That money, transferred from Russia to Luxembourg, came from unsecured loans granted to Mezhprombank by the Russian government in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, Kommersant said.
While Pugachyov no longer has a formal connection to Mezhprombank, he is believed by investigators to still be its main beneficiary, the newspaper said.
According to Kommersant, the arrest in absentia is needed in order to put Pugachyov on the Interpol wanted list and have him extradited.
The oligarch’s current whereabouts are unknown, according to investigators.
