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Former judge of Asbest court in Sverdlovsk Region charged with grand bribery wanted

The Fourth Department of the Investigative Committee’s Directorate based in the city of Yekaterinburg continues criminal proceedings against former judge of Asbest town court of Sverdlovsk Region Maksim Vinogradov. He has been charged in absentia with taking a bribe on a very large scale by extortion under Part 6 of Article 290 of the RF Penal Code.

According to investigators, Vinogradov received from a notary a cash bribe of 6 million rubles on 24 June 2016 through the mediation of assistant court president Konstantin Zakharov and businessman from Asbest Viktor Zubov. The notary was the defendant in one of criminal cases tried by Vinogradov and was charged with 18 counts of fraudulent real estate transactions. She gave the bribery to Vinogradov so that he evicted her.

Vinogradov escaped from investigators during a long procedure of receiving consent from the Sverdlovsk Region qualification board of judges for the initiation of the investigation necessary because of Vinogradov’s special status. The accused is known to have left the Russian Federation together with all his family so he has been put on a wanted list.

At present the investigators and operative services are taking steps to locate the accused and detain him.

There is an ongoing investigation against Zubov and Sakharov, who are cooperating with the investigation and are charged with intermediacy in bribery under Part 4 of article 291.1 of the RF Penal Code.