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Criminal case into illegal actions of Mezhprombank management related to billions of dollars embezzlement sent to court

The Main Investigative Department of the Investigative Committee of Russia has completed an investigation into a criminal case against Marina Illarionova, the former acting chairman of the executive directorate of CJSC International Industrial Bank. She is accused of committing an offence under Part 2 of Article 201 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (use by a person performing managerial functions in a commercial organization, its authority contrary to the legitimate interests of the organization and in order to derive benefits and advantages for himself or for other persons, resulting in grave consequences, committed by an organized group).

According to the investigation, in 2008-2009 member of the Federation Council of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation Sergey Pugachev organized a criminal group which in 2010 included Acting Chairman of the Executive Board of "International Industrial Bank" Marina Illarionova. The criminal group under the management of Pugachev arranged the theft of the bank's monetary assets in 2008-2009, including by issuing knowingly irrecoverable loans to companies controlled by Pugachev in the amount of more than 64 billion rubles in June 2009. Pugachev pledged shares of a foreign company belonging to him worth more than 77 billion rubles in order to give the appearance of legality to his actions.

The role of Illarionova consisted in illegal withdrawal of the pledge from the above shares and cancellation of pledge agreements in August 2010. As a result, the bank was deprived of the opportunity to foreclose on them in order to reimburse the loan debt on the loans previously issued to the companies under Pugachev's control.

Since 2016 Illarionova was a wanted person, in September 2020, as a result of the search operations conducted by the Department of Economic and Forensic Activity of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia in Moscow, she was detained and placed in custody.

The investigation collected sufficient evidence and the criminal case against Illarionova with an approved indictment was sent to court to be considered on the merits.

Earlier the court sentenced the participants of the criminal group headed by Pugachev - the chairman of the executive direction of "International Industrial Bank" Alexander Didenko and director general of "UIC Development" Dmitry Amunts for the theft of funds of ZAO "International Industrial Bank" under Article 160 of the Criminal Code (embezzlement or misappropriation).

Currently Sergei Pugachev, accused of committing offenses under Part 3 of Article 33, Part 4 of Article 160 of the Criminal Code, Part 3 of Article 33, Part 2 of Article 201 of the Criminal Code, is currently in international wanted list. A measure of restraint in the form of detention was chosen against him in absentia.