Sasha Mineev. Who seized the assets of the Party

Yuri Vershov

On Monday, the funeral of oligarch Alexander Mineev, who was shot dead by killers last week, took place. As Rosbalt managed to find out, until recently he was the owner of real estate in prestigious places in Moscow worth over $700 million. In the fall of 2013, employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Dagestan unexpectedly conducted a search in Mineev’s capital offices as part of an investigation into the financing of militants. Soon after this, over twenty buildings that belonged to the businessman turned out to be transferred to certain natives of the Caucasus. When the oligarch turned to law enforcement agencies, he was killed.

The funeral of Alexander Mineev took place on January 27 at the Khovanskoye cemetery in Moscow. They were attended by close friends of the oligarch and employees of his companies. Mineev’s ex-wife and children, who live in England, did not risk flying to Russia because they fear for their safety. A Rosbalt correspondent talked with several of the oligarch’s business partners, who have recently been part of his inner circle. They told their version of the events leading to the crime.

The agency's interlocutors noted that Alexander Mineev was a secretive person with an extremely difficult character. Therefore, over the years of his life he did not have many friends. The most famous of them are entrepreneur Oleg Boyko and rock singer Boris Grebenshchikov (Mineev was a fan of the work of the leader of the Aquarium group).

Alexander Mineev began doing business in the late 1980s and early 1990s, during the heyday of cooperation. Mineev himself told his acquaintances that at that time he often had to contact representatives of the Solntsevskaya criminal group, and he knew some of its leaders personally. Then the entrepreneur’s social circle changed. He could often be found with senior officials of the FSB of the Russian Federation and the Customs Committee. This was due to the fact that Mineev began supplying large quantities of household appliances to Russia. And such a business was simply not possible without the help of the security forces supervising imports. After some time, Mineev created the country's first chain of stores selling equipment, called "Party", which brought in huge profits. At the end of the 1990s, Party merged with another network, Domino. The leadership in this alliance belonged to Mineev. However, due to the complex nature of the relationship with new partners, the businessman did not work out. In the early 2000s, the entrepreneur unexpectedly closed down his entire business selling household appliances, after which he and his family went to live in London. He never told anyone about the reasons for such an act.

However, as Rosbalt managed to find out, Mineev could afford to remain calmly and comfortably in England. By the time of his departure, he was the owner of 21 real estate properties in Moscow. Thus, he owned a shopping and office center on Kutuzovsky Prospekt, 88, a shopping center near the Taganskaya metro station, a shopping center on Kaluzhskaya Square, buildings on Lubyanka and Staraya Squares, etc. All these real estate properties were registered to 18 companies: Lubyanka LLC, Na Bolshaya Polyanka LLC, U Taganka LLC, etc. The founders were offshore structures, which in turn belonged to other offshore companies. This whole long chain eventually led to Mineev. Formally, 18 companies rented out premises to a management company (in recent years it was Eurasia LLC, also owned by Mineev through offshore companies), and the latter already subleased them. The buildings generated a monthly income of 350 million rubles.

According to Rosbalt's interlocutors, in England Mineev actually lived as a rentier, received money from his premises, and did not interfere in the work of top managers. However, then he had a fight with his wife. During the divorce, the High Court of London left most of the foreign real estate to his ex-wife and children, also ordering the businessman to pay them 30 million pounds sterling.

The upset oligarch returned to Russia in the summer of 2012, where he decided to take charge of the operational management of his real estate business. But again, due to his difficult character, he immediately quarreled with all the top managers, whom he then fired. According to agency sources, people, often random, began to replace them. Many important personnel decisions were generally made during feasts. “Sometimes the opinion arose that Alexander was trying every day to break the Guinness book record for the number and variety of strong drinks consumed per day. The complexity of his character was largely due to this,” Rosbalt’s interlocutors complained.

New top managers were not checked, since Mineev had virtually no real security service: one person was responsible for all such questions. His attention was attracted by a native of Dagestan who received a responsible post in “Eurasia”. It turned out that the new top manager at different times used passports under three different names, and was also involved in various dubious stories. This was reported to Mineev, who fired his own protege in September 2013. Along with the native of Dagestan, several minor constituent documents disappeared. Back then they didn’t attach much importance to it.

And already in early November, a group of employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Dagestan arrived at the office of Eurasia LLC on Kutuzovsky Prospekt with a search warrant. From the documents presented it followed that a case of financing illegal armed groups was being investigated in the republic. Allegedly, during a search in one of the mountain villages, a document with the seal of Eurasia LLC was found, which gave rise to investigative actions in the office on Kutuzovsky Prospekt. According to Rosbalt's interlocutors, for some reason the visitors showed particular interest in the constituent documents of the very 18 companies to which the buildings are registered. But they were not in the room. The next day, Dagestan security forces again appeared at Eurasia LLC and interrogated the top managers of the company, handing them farewell summonses with summonses for questioning to Dagestan.

Three days later, when the financial director of Eurasia LLC was leaving the office on Kutuzovsky, an unknown person of Caucasian appearance ran up to him. The attacker hit the financier on the head with a baton and tried to take away a large briefcase - apparently the attacker believed that the constituent documents might be there. However, the financial director turned out to be physically well developed. He managed not only to fight off the criminal, but also rushed after him. At that moment, a car jumped out from around the corner, hit an Eurasia employee, the attacker jumped into the car and disappeared.

In December 2013, the Central Bank of the Russian Federation revoked the license of the bank, which held the accounts of 18 companies controlled by Mineev. To open new accounts in another bank, extracts from the Unified State Register of Legal Entities were required. Having received them, the oligarch’s subordinates were surprised to see that the founders of all 18 companies were offshore structures that had nothing to do with Mineev, and certain natives of the North Caucasus were appointed general directors. All changes were made using forged documents. Realizing that they had lost almost everything in an instant, Mineev and his lawyers urgently, through the arbitration courts, imposed interim measures on the buildings and submitted an application to the Economic Security and Commissariat for Economic Crimes of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in Moscow. While they were doing this, another blow was dealt to Mineev’s business: the management company “Eurasia” was re-registered to an unknown offshore, and a resident of Dagestan, Omar Suleymanovich Suleymanov, became its general director in the Unified State Legal Entity.

All events took place shortly after the New Year. Mineev realized that he simply could not resist the seizure of assets on his own. “Only then did he really come to his senses, change his lifestyle a little and begin to develop a plan of response, in particular, he began to create a powerful security service, recruiting several retired security officials to work,” Rosbalt’s interlocutors said. New applications were quickly submitted to law enforcement agencies, and a pre-investigation investigation was launched. Powerful guards were posted in all buildings, awaiting their possible seizure by force. Also, the new heads of the security service proposed assigning personal security to Mineev himself, but he flatly refused.

Since his return to Russia, the oligarch has lived in a cottage in the village of Zagoryanka, not far from Korolev near Moscow (he opened his personal office in this city). This caused a lot of inconvenience to absolutely all top managers of Eurasia, who had to travel to their boss out of town almost every day (Mineev himself categorically refused to appear in Moscow). He also believed that nothing threatened him in Korolev. As it turned out, he was wrong.

On January 22, 2014, a Range Rover, together with an oligarch and his driver, was driving from Zagoryanka to an office in Korolev. Mineev was sitting in the front passenger seat. When the car stopped at a traffic light, a Mitsubishi Lancer slowed down on the driver’s side and slightly behind it, and an automatic rifle appeared from the window. The criminal fired obliquely, across the entire interior of the Range Rover. The fired 27 bullets hit Mineev, and he died on the spot from his injuries. The driver was not injured. A criminal case was initiated into the murder under Art. 105 (murder) and art. 222 (illegal arms trafficking) of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.

A Rosbalt source in law enforcement agencies noted that there are certain “clues” suggesting that the perpetrators of the murder were current or former militants, in connection with the investigation into the financing of which a strange search was carried out in Mineev’s office by the Dagestan Ministry of Internal Affairs. However, who exactly is behind the seizure of all the oligarch’s assets worth over $700 million is not yet known. Perhaps this will be established during the murder investigation.

The agency's interlocutors note that some of Mineev's real estate is located in places that can be considered strategically important in terms of ensuring security from the terrorist threat. The shopping and office center is located right next to Kutuzovsky Prospekt and Rublevskoye Highway, along which motorcades with top officials of the state pass almost every day. The building on Old Square is adjacent to the presidential administration. And the building on Lubyanka Square is located next to the headquarters of the FSB of the Russian Federation.

Divorce, raiders, execution

Alexander Mineev died, just like in the 90s

Original of this material
© "Kommersant", 01/23/2014, A businessman of the 90s died, just like in the old days

Alexander Zheglov

[...] Alexander Mineev was ambushed by killers at one of the intersections on Tsiolkovsky Street in the center of the city of Korolev. As the businessman's driver-bodyguard Vyacheslav Buganov, who was not injured as a result of the attack, told investigators, he was driving the boss to Moscow from a country mansion in the village of Zagoryanka in a Range Rover. Mr. Mineev had several appointments, including with doctors - he suffered from a severe form of diabetes, which had already led to gangrene of his left leg.

When the businessman’s car stopped at a red traffic light, a dark SUV pulled alongside it, after which its window rolled down and machine gun shots were heard. Alexander Mineev had no chance to survive: the killer, who fired point-blank through the side window of the passenger door, literally riddled the businessman. At the scene, experts found 27 cartridges from a Kalashnikov assault rifle.

The official representative of the Main Investigation Department of the Investigative Committee for the Moscow Region, Olga Vradiy, said that a criminal case has been opened under Art. 105 (murder) and art. 222 (illegal arms trafficking) of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. According to Kommersant, ballistic, biological and forensic examinations have already been ordered as part of the investigation of the case. In addition, the investigation requested from telecom operators data on mobile phone connections in the area of the businessman’s country mansion in Zagoryanka and along his route, believing that the murderer’s accomplices were watching the victim, as well as data from the Potok automatic vehicle control and registration system. Using them, the investigation will try to find out what kind of car the killers used and where they fled.

According to Kommersant sources familiar with the investigation, the main version is a contract killing related to the commercial activities of Alexander Mineev.

Alexander Mineev was a very wealthy man. In the early 90s, he was one of the first to engage in the trade of household appliances, which at that time, in conditions of increased public demand for this group of goods, brought huge profits. The trading network "Party" founded by him, which was later transformed into a trade and financial group of companies, was one of the market leaders for a long time. In addition, the entrepreneur was also involved in financial business. He was a co-owner and chairman of the board of directors of Rost Bank, a stake in which he subsequently sold.

When demand for household appliances fell in the early 2000s as a result of market saturation, many sellers went bankrupt. Due to falling profitability, the businessman was also forced to close his retail chain. The “Party” ceased to exist, but Alexander Mineev only became richer from this.

The fact is that, while developing his retail network in the 90s, he did not rent premises, like everyone else, but acquired them. As a result, he found himself the owner of a huge number of commercial real estate properties in Moscow, St. Petersburg and other large cities of Russia, the prices of which have increased significantly in the last decade. According to the investigation, the main source of income for Mr. Mineev in recent years was the rent received from the rental of these premises. At the same time, his property was repeatedly subjected to raider attacks. The investigation does not rule out that the murder could have been caused by one of these property conflicts.

At the same time, according to Kommersant's source, the investigation will also check other possible versions of the crime. For example, related to the personal life of Alexander Mineev. Several years ago, he went through a complex divorce process with his wife, which was accompanied by legal disputes over the division of property in the courts of Great Britain and Russia. According to one of the friends of the deceased, as a result of the divorce, Mr. Mineev almost completely lost his property in London, which went to his ex-wife. At the same time, he managed to sue her for several Moscow apartments worth more than 100 million rubles, which, according to his wife, he gave her as a gift. In September 2012, the Nikulinsky District Court of Moscow found that donation agreements for four apartments in elite buildings and districts were drawn up on the basis of a power of attorney, which the businessman could not physically sign, since on the day of its preparation he was not in Russia, but in the UK. As a result, the contracts were declared invalid and the apartments again became the property of the businessman. Mr. Mineev’s wife tried to appeal this decision to the appellate instance of the Moscow City Court, but to no avail. The lawyer for the entrepreneur's widow made it clear to Kommersant that he does not want to discuss the details of this process.

Who is Alexander Mineev

Private bussiness

Mineev Alexander Anatolyevich was born on March 4, 1964 in Moscow. Graduated from the Moscow Instrument-Making Institute.

In 1992, together with his partner Mikhail Kuznetsov, he founded the Party group, which sold household appliances and electronics. The group soon became the largest on the market; in 1996, its turnover exceeded $580 million. The Party was the first to open an electronics supermarket in Moscow, and its slogan “Beyond politics, beyond competition” became widely known. In 1997, Messrs. Mineev and Kuznetsov opened the Domino chain in Moscow, selling expensive furniture, clothing, shoes and household goods.

At the end of the 1990s, Mikhail Kuznetsov and a number of top managers left the Party. By 2003, the network's turnover had dropped to $160 million. Market participants cited inattention to consumer lending and large-scale investments in real estate, which froze large sums, as the causes of the problems. At the end of 2004, it was announced that 13 of the 17 Party stores would be closed, their areas would be transferred to Domino, and the remaining stores would be repurposed. In the same year, the media mentioned that Alexander Mineev controlled Rost Bank. In 2006, it was bought by the VEFC Corporation, the deal was estimated at $11-19 million.

In the spring of 2005, Mr. Mineev announced the closure of the Domino chain. Amfin LLC, which belonged to him, took over the rental of the remaining real estate. The company's total turnover in 2005-2009 (later data was not disclosed) amounted to 1.13 billion rubles. In 2011, the company was renamed LLC Millennium and liquidated in 2012. [...]

Electronics.

One of the first Russian businessmen, he began to engage in entrepreneurship in the late 1980s at the end of the Soviet era. In the early 1990s, he founded Russia’s first chain of stores selling household and office equipment called “Party”. He was the first in Russia to begin mass trade in copiers. In 1996, the trading company's turnover exceeded $580 million, as a result of which "Party" became the absolute leader in the market of household and office equipment.

By 2014, he was the owner of real estate in prestigious areas of Moscow totaling more than $700 million. A number of objects that belonged to Mineev are located on Kutuzovsky Prospekt, Rublevsky Shosse, Staraya Square, Lubyanskaya Square. Mineev’s entire property was estimated at $1 billion, but after his death, the notary discovered an inheritance of only three used cars.

Killed in the Moscow region as a result of an assassination attempt on January 22, 2014. The main motive of the crime is the raider seizure of Mineev’s real estate.

Biography

Education and early career

Born on March 4, 1964 in Moscow into a working-class family. Graduated from the Moscow Instrument-Making Institute. Mineev briefly mentioned his education: “I studied, but did not suffer.” By the early 1990s, Mineev worked as a manager at the Tomo company, which sold Panasonic office telephone exchanges. Mineev left the Tomo company after the owner rejected his offer to add to telephony products that were very promising at that time - computers and office equipment. Then Mineev decided to develop the promising market on his own. He brought in Mikhail Kuznetsov as a partner, who had experience in selling copiers. In 1992-1994, Mineev had three stores offering customers phones, computers and office equipment. In the early 1990s, in the unsaturated Russian market, for entrepreneurs who managed to find start-up capital, trading in equipment brought extremely fast and impressive profits. According to top managers, the profitability of such retail chains in Russia then reached 200% per month.

Trading business

In 1992, together with Kuznetsov, Mineev created the Party company. The company's financial success was associated with the use of retail technologies that were innovative for Russian business. "Party" became the first company in Russia to open an electronics store with a free display of goods - a supermarket on Kaluzhskaya Square, and was also the first to introduce the practice of sales. The “Party” was the first of the equipment sellers to begin television advertising: in a video broadcast on television, a creative sorcerer “created” a photocopier to the sound of magical music. Consumers also remembered its slogan. Journalists Leonid Miloslavsky and Andrei Vasiliev (at various stages related to the Kommersant publishing house) suggested that Mineev call the company “Party.” Vasiliev then came up with a catchy and memorable slogan: “Out of politics! No competition! .

Kuznetsov became the general director of the Party company, and Mineev became his deputy. However, the controlling stakes remained with Mineev, as the ideologist of business. It was noted that Mineev had little understanding of finance, but he was a “generator of ideas” regarding the range of products, sales, marketing and organizational issues of business, and was distinguished by his keen intuition. One of Mineev’s innovative ideas, which led to rapid business growth, was the parallel development of wholesale and retail trade - the capacity of the consumer market was then enormous in Russia. Taking this into account, Mineev acted on a powerful geographical scale. Expanding the dealer network, the Party company found partners even in Khabarovsk and Vladivostok. Large volumes of purchases and the status of an official distributor enabled the company to receive large discounts from suppliers. At the same time, retail prices in Party stores were the highest among competing chains, which did not deter customers attracted by the widest selection and famous brands. This provided the company with enormous profitability. It was noted that in Mineev’s stores one could buy “everything that can be plugged into an outlet,” while new models of equipment appeared in retail sales a week after their announcements came out in the West. "Party" was the largest dealer of the Hewlett-Packard brand in Russia. Mineev's invention was also his new system for selecting and training salespeople in stores.

A characteristic feature of the partners’ business was not renting, but purchasing stores as their own, which brought significant benefits to the owners in the long term. In 1994, the Party entered the household appliances and electronics business. In 1996, the turnover of the Party company exceeded $580 million. According to this indicator, the company was more than 4 times ahead of M.Video - second on the market with $120 million. By this time, "Party" had 10 stores in Moscow and about 200 dealers in Russian regions.

Mineev’s special pride was the General Electric store, located in the building of a federal historical monument in Moscow on the corner of Maly Cherkassky Lane and Novaya Square. The store had windows directly overlooking Lubyanka Square and the FSB of the Russian Federation quarter. In this building in February 1999, Mineev opened the Fashion-Domino department store, which sold products from world-famous brands Pierre Cardin, Givenchy, Kenzo, Cacharel.

In 1997, Party opened the Domino chain of stores, where it established trade in expensive clothing, shoes and luxury furniture. Businessmen responded to the 1998 crisis by repurposing Domino to sell household goods. At the same time, Mikhail Kuznetsov and a number of top managers left the company. Despite the decrease in turnover, the Domino chain continued to operate until 2003.

Until 2004, Mineev controlled Rost Bank for some time, then sold his stake at a profit. In the same year, the Party company, which became known as the trade and financial group, entered a problematic period: as a result of market saturation, the demand for household appliances fell, purchase volumes had to be reduced, and employees began to be delayed in salaries. According to experts, the company failed to navigate the new market and price situation, when electronics began to be purchased en masse not by the elite, but by the middle class. In 2005, the Party company finally ceased trading.

Rental business

Thanks to the sharply increased price of real estate, Mineev remained a very wealthy man after leaving retail. Having sold part of the premises he owned and rented out the other part, Mineev moved to the UK, lived in London as a rentier, began to call himself a “pensioner” and intervened little in the management of his sharply increased assets in Moscow, St. Petersburg and other Russian cities. . In total, the businessman left 21 real estate properties in Russia, including a shopping and office center in house No. 88 on Kutuzovsky Prospekt, shopping centers near the Taganskaya metro station and on Kaluzhskaya Square, buildings on Lubyanka and Staraya Squares. The property brought Mineev, as the ultimate beneficiary, monthly income from sublease in the amount of 350 million rubles through the management company Eurasia.

Divorce proceedings

In the mid-2000s, while living in London, Mineev faced a crisis in his family life and found himself involved in a protracted divorce process, which negatively affected his condition. The High Court of London awarded Mineev's ex-wife and three children a significant part of the businessman's foreign real estate and ordered him to pay them £30 million. In particular, Mineev lost almost all his real estate in London. In 2012, the businessman, however, in the Nikulinsky District Court sued his ex-wife for several luxury apartments in Moscow with a total value of more than 100 million rubles. The consequences of the divorce and the difficulties that arose during the division of property were considered by detectives in 2014 as one of the versions of the murder of Mineev.

Conflict with the Dagestan group

In the summer of 2012, Mineev returned to Russia and himself stood at the administrative levers of the Eurasia company, which leased his real estate. Having replaced almost all top managers, Mineev recruited new employees, among whom there were many random and unverified individuals with dubious biographies and reputations. Mineev himself, according to evidence, in the last years of his life often abused alcohol, and made many important personnel decisions during feasts. The conflict, which ended in a tragic ending, began that same fall, when Mineev fired one of the top managers of Eurasia: as it turned out, the native of Dagestan had forged documents in three different names. Along with his departure from the company, important documents disappeared. A month later, a group of employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Dagestan arrived with a search at the Moscow office of Eurasia with a sanction to seize documents on the case of financing militants being investigated in the republic. The reason for the search was the discovery in one of the mountain villages of a document with the seal of Eurasia LLC.

Features of character and personality

Contemporaries and business partners noted Mineev’s energetic creative mind, intuition, determination, tough temperament, a fair amount of arrogance, and business snobbery. At the same time, it was difficult to determine whether this snobbery was an initial reflection of his character or whether Mineev was so influenced by the wealth and commercial success that quickly came to him. As Alexander Kabanov, chairman of the board of directors of the Mir company, noted, due to the feeling of superiority, which Mineev did not hide, it was difficult to communicate with him. Although everything that Alexander said seemed logical and justified.”

Murder

After returning to Russia, Mineev lived with his girlfriend in the cottage village of Zagoryansky in the near Moscow region. His office was located in Korolev, where all the top managers of the Eurasia company traveled from Moscow to report to the boss.

Alexander Mineev was shot dead on the afternoon of January 22, 2014 in the center of Korolev on Tsiolkovsky Street during a trip from the village of Zagoryanka to Moscow, when his Range Rover stopped at a pedestrian crossing. The killers fired 27 shots from a Kalashnikov assault rifle, seven bullets hit the target. Mineev died on the spot from his injuries; his driver-bodyguard was not injured. A criminal case has been initiated.

He was buried at the Khovanskoye Cemetery. His ex-wife and three of his children did not come from England to the funeral ceremony, fearing for their lives

Mineev Alexander Anatolyevich (born March 4, 1964, Moscow, RSFSR, USSR - died January 22, 2014, Korolev, Moscow region, Russian Federation) - Russian businessman, founder of Russia's first electronics supermarket.

Graduated from the Moscow Instrument-Making Institute. Started business in the early 90s. In 1992-1994, Mineev had three stores offering customers phones, computers and office equipment. In the early 1990s, he founded Russia’s first chain of stores selling household and office equipment called “Party”. The company existed until 2005.

In 1997, Party opened the Domino chain of stores, where it established trade in expensive clothing, shoes and luxury furniture. Businessmen responded to the 1998 crisis by repurposing Domino to sell household goods. Despite the decline in turnover, the Domino chain continued to operate until 2003. Until 2004, Mineev controlled Rost Bank for some time, then sold his stake. Owned more than 20 real estate properties through the management company "Eurasia".

In the mid-2000s, while living in London, Mineev became involved in a protracted divorce process. The High Court of London awarded Mineev's ex-wife and three children a significant part of the businessman's foreign real estate and ordered him to pay them 30 million pounds sterling. In particular, Mineev lost almost all his real estate in London. In 2012, a businessman in the Nikulinsky District Court sued his ex-wife for several luxury apartments in Moscow with a total value of more than 100 million rubles.

In the summer of 2012, Mineev returned to Russia and himself headed the Eurasia company, which leased his real estate. Having replaced almost all top managers, Mineev recruited new employees, among whom there were many random and unverified individuals with dubious biographies and reputations. Alexander Mineev was shot dead on January 22, 2014 in the center of Korolev. Mineev died on the spot from his injuries; his driver-bodyguard was not injured. His ex-wife and three of his children did not come from England to the funeral ceremony, fearing for their lives. In November 2014, it became known that charges of murder and fraudulent actions with the victim’s property were brought against the former top manager of Mineev’s company, Boris Karamatov, as well as his accomplice, the alleged GRU general Dmitry Kurylenko, and the direct perpetrators were most likely natives of Dagestan. In 2015, Boris Berezovsky's son-in-law Georgy Shuppe, who lives in the UK, was arrested in absentia by a Moscow court on charges of organizing the murder of Mineev and fraud with his property.

Notary Alexey Solovyov, who is involved in Mineev’s inheritance, soon after the death of the businessman announced to his heirs, including the eldest of three children, son Vsevolod (living in the UK), that no significant property was found registered directly to the murdered billionaire, except for three used cars . No shopping centers, bank accounts, apartments, or country houses were found among Mineev’s property.

The funeral of Alexander Mineev took place on January 27, 2014 at the Khovanskoye cemetery in Moscow. They were attended by close friends of the oligarch and employees of his companies. Mineev’s ex-wife and children, who live in England, did not risk flying to Russia because they fear for their safety. A Rosbalt correspondent talked with several of the oligarch’s business partners, who have recently been part of his inner circle. They told their version of the events leading to the crime.

The agency's interlocutors noted that Alexander Mineev was a secretive person with an extremely difficult character. Therefore, over the years of his life he did not have many friends. The most famous of them are entrepreneur Oleg Boyko and rock singer Boris Grebenshchikov (Mineev was a fan of the work of the leader of the Aquarium group).

Alexander Mineev began doing business in the late 1980s and early 1990s, during the heyday of cooperation. Mineev himself told his acquaintances that at that time he often had to contact representatives of the Solntsevskaya criminal group, and he knew some of its leaders personally. Then the entrepreneur’s social circle changed. He could often be found with senior officials of the FSB of the Russian Federation and the Customs Committee. This was due to the fact that Mineev began supplying large quantities of household appliances to Russia. And such a business was simply not possible without the help of the security forces supervising imports. After some time, Mineev created the country's first chain of stores selling equipment, called "Party", which brought in huge profits. At the end of the 1990s, Party merged with another network, Domino. The leadership in this alliance belonged to Mineev. However, due to the complex nature of the relationship with new partners, the businessman did not work out. In the early 2000s, the entrepreneur unexpectedly shut down his entire business selling household appliances, after which he and his family went to live in London. He never told anyone about the reasons for such an act.

In December 2013, the Central Bank of the Russian Federation revoked the license of the bank, which held the accounts of 18 companies controlled by Mineev. To open new accounts in another bank, extracts from the Unified State Register of Legal Entities were required. Having received them, the oligarch’s subordinates were surprised to see that the founders of all 18 companies were offshore structures that had nothing to do with Mineev, and certain natives of the North Caucasus were appointed general directors. All changes were made using forged documents. Realizing that they had lost almost everything in an instant, Mineev and his lawyers urgently, through the arbitration courts, imposed interim measures on the buildings and submitted an application to the Economic Security and Commissariat for Economic Crimes of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in Moscow. While they were doing this, Mineev’s business was dealt another blow: the management company “Eurasia” was re-registered to an unknown offshore, and its general director in the Unified State Register of Legal Entities began to be listed as a resident of Dagestan, Omar Suleymanovich Suleymanov.

"Mineev case"led to the "customers" of Klebnikov's murder

The investigation into the murder of tycoon Alexander Mineev may lead to the identification of the “customers” of a number of other high-profile crimes committed in Russia and Ukraine. In particular, the assassination attempt on the “right hand” of oligarch Igor Kolomoisky, Gennady Korban, and the execution of the editor-in-chief of the Russian version of Forbes magazine, Paul Klebnikov. The “threads” from all these crimes led to businessman Mikhail Nekrich.

As a Rosbalt source in law enforcement agencies said, the investigation into the execution of Alexander Mineev is gaining momentum. On New Year's Eve, the alleged organizers, Mikhail Nekrich and Boris Berezovsky's son-in-law Georgy Shuppe, were put on the international wanted list. Alexander Prokopenko, who took part in an attempted raider seizure of Mineev’s buildings worth $1 billion, was also detained.

According to the agency's interlocutor, various searches and interrogations take place almost weekly. Thus, several lawyers who represented Nekrich’s interests in the Russian Federation, as well as his personal bodyguards, have already given testimony. Comparing their information with operational data, law enforcement officials began to re-examine two more “high-profile” crimes: the attempt on Corban’s life and the murder of Paul Klebnikov. Now, in particular, information is being verified according to which in 2004 it was Nekrich who could have transferred a large sum of money to the leader of the “Lazan” criminal group, Khozh-Akhmed Nukhaev, to organize an attack in Moscow on the editor-in-chief of Forbes. This is evidenced both by operational materials and some witness testimony.

According to this version, Nekrich organized the crime not in his own interests, but for a third “unidentified” person. The main contender for this role is the now deceased oligarch Boris Berezovsky, whom Nekrich knew well and has been friends with his son-in-law Georgy Shuppe for a long time.

Nukhaev accepted the “order,” one might say, with pleasure, since he himself had a grudge against Khlebnikov. The journalist published the book “Conversation with a Barbarian,” in which the leader of the “Lazan” group, who was trying to build a political career in the West, was presented as an ordinary bandit associated with Berezovsky.

Next, Nukhaev handed over the “order” to the “authority” Lom-Ali Gaitukaev, who was in Moscow, who, according to investigators, involved in the operation a former employee of the Moscow Regional Directorate for Combating Organized Crime, Sergei Khadzhikurbanov (organized the surveillance and the work of the killers), and an employee of the Moscow Central Internal Affairs Directorate Dmitry Pavlyuchenkov (led the surveillance) and Kazbek Dukuzov (directly responsible for the elimination).

In 2004, Nekrich and Khozh-Akhmed Nukhaev were not only good acquaintances, but also business partners. Together they controlled a large oil transshipment point in Odessa. Soon another participant appeared in this project in the person of the Privat group of Igor Kolomoisky. Nekrich has known the latter, according to the agency’s source, for a very long time - “from the times when both businessmen were “nobodies.” However, as a law enforcement interlocutor said, Nekrich did not have a good relationship with Kolomoisky’s “right hand” Gennady Korban.

The result of this conflict was that in 2005, Privat simply pushed Nekrich and Nukhaev away from managing the oil transshipment point. Already in March 2006, a group of Chechen killers riddled the car with Korban with a machine gun, but he himself remained alive. During the investigation, the killer Arsen Dzhamburaev, as well as the “authority” Lom-Ali Gaitukaev were arrested. The latter in Russia, according to materials received from Ukraine, was convicted of organizing an attack on Korban.

The “customers” of the assassination attempt were never identified. For some reason, the media persistently included among them the authoritative Russian businessman Maxim Kurochkin (Max Beshenny), who was in conflict with Korban over the Ozerki market. Kurochkin was shot by a sniper near one of the Ukrainian courts, where he was taken to extend his arrest for fraud related to Ozerki.

However, after the emergence of new information obtained during the investigation into the murder of Mineev, Russian law enforcement officers are working on the version that Nekrich and Nukhaev could also be involved in organizing the attack on Korban, entrusting the execution of the “order” to Gaitukaev.

It is worth noting that the information collected by law enforcement officers in the “Mineev case” complements the information previously received by the RF IC in the “Khlebnikov case” and “fits” into it.

According to Pavlyuchenkov’s testimony, in the spring of 2004, the leader of the “Lazan” criminal group, Khozh-Akhmed Nukhaev (Khan), approached the Chechen “authority” Lom-Ali Gaitukaev (convicted of the murder of Anna Politkovskaya) with a proposal to organize the murder of Paul Klebnikov. Gaitukaev involved Sergei Khadzhikurbanov in the work, who at that time was under recognizance not to leave for official crimes. Khlebnikov was placed under surveillance. For these purposes, Khadzhikurbanov, according to investigators, recruited then-current employees of the police department. Later, these same policemen watched Anna Politkovskaya as her murder was being prepared.

Together with Pavlyuchenkov’s subordinates, Khadzhikurbanov himself “led” Khlebnikov. At one point, he announced that he no longer needed the services of the security department employees. According to the Russian Investigative Committee, the brothers Magomed and Kazbek Dukuzov and their acquaintances were then brought in to spy on Klebnikov. It is noteworthy that Khadzhikurbanov never paid Pavlyuchenkov and his colleagues for the work performed.

Information that Gaitukaev and Nukhaev discussed the “order for Khlebnikov” in Turkey was confirmed by another witness. This is a former militant who lived in Turkey and was close to Nukhaev. He is currently serving a sentence in Russia for a domestic crime. This witness stated that Nukhaev organized the murder of Khlebnikov not for himself, but at the request of third parties. According to him, Khozh-Akhmed Nukhaev was an intermediary who transmitted orders for the murder of Klebnikov from customers living abroad to his people located in Moscow. First of all - Gaitukaev.

Yuri Vershov

Bloody battle for the “Party’s” gold: the mystery of the murder of billionaire Mineev

The oligarch is killed, the inheritance is stolen - a classic version of a showdown in Russian with the participation of security forces

MK, October 1, 2015

On January 27, 2014, the Khovanskoye cemetery was crowded and pathetic. All the assembled businessmen seemed to be mourning not the late billionaire (founder of Russia's first electronics supermarket) Alexander Mineev, but themselves. The oligarchs looked at the coffin and thought: “If a person with such connections in the FSB and intelligence was killed in broad daylight, this is a bad sign for everyone.” Everyone was afraid of redistribution.

And now the chronology of events.

Employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Dagestan come to Moscow and conduct a search in Mineev’s offices. The reason is an investigation into the financing of militants.

December 2013.

Mineev discovers that over twenty buildings that belonged to him were registered, including to certain natives of the Caucasus. And writes statements to law enforcement agencies.

Mineev's jeep, slowed down at a pedestrian crossing in Korolev, Moscow Region, is shot by killers with a Kalashnikov assault rifle. Of the 27 bullets fired, seven hit the target.

One of these days, the case of the murder of billionaire Mineev will be brought to court. GRU General Dmitry Kurylenko, businessman Boris Karamatov and lawyer Yulia Egorova will be in the dock. The son-in-law of the famous oligarch Boris Berezovsky, Georgy Shuppe, was found accused in absentia and put on the international wanted list. But what was their role?! And why do experts draw parallels between this murder and two more seemingly unrelated ones - Shabtai Kalmanovich and Boris Nemtsov?

About this in the investigation of the MK special correspondent.

Hello from the 90s

This is our strangest investigation of all, because no one in our story can be trusted - not a single one of the security services. You will understand why when you find out everything to the end. In the meantime, my interlocutor is a representative of the elite of the criminal world, a close friend of Yaponchik (Vyacheslav Ivankov valued him for his special analytical talent). The agreement is this: I present the facts that I managed to find out, and my interlocutor comments on them.

But first, a little about Mineev. Man-era. Mineev was the first in Russia to begin the mass trade of photocopiers. The company he founded, “Party,” was the only one selling electronics in the early 90s. You probably remember the advertising slogan - “out of politics, out of competition”? Then the oligarch opened a chain of stores selling luxury furniture and clothing, and at the same time bought a lot of real estate. Some of the objects that belonged to Mineev were located along specially protected government routes. And he himself did not hesitate to give his companies meaningful names: for example, “Lubyanka”. At the time of the murder, Mineev’s property was estimated at $1 billion.

It was unsinkable because it had “roofs” at all levels, says one of his close friends, Pavel. - He himself lived “according to the concepts” that he accepted back then, in the 90s. At the beginning of our acquaintance, I went to his dacha for a party. Bandits, security officers, police generals sat at the same table... And it turned out that this one was his classmate, this one was his childhood friend, this one was his son-in-law, etc. I have family and friendly relations with everyone. And they appreciated him for the ease with which he communicated and generally looked at the world. A businessman, say, would come to him with a big problem, and Mineev would make jokes and jokes and pour him a glass of something stronger. “Drink, lucky one!” - he says laughing. I picked up the phone, dialed the number and decided everything! Thus, he returned shoulder straps, closed criminal cases, and stopped wars between entire services.

However, he was clearly not omnipotent and from the beginning of the 2000s he began to seriously fear for his life (this, apparently, was connected with the war of the security forces who were “protecting” the smuggling of furniture). I even bought myself an armored Mercedes. And then he flew out of harm’s way to London. The real estate that he bought in Russia brought him hundreds of millions a month (Mineev rented out large shopping centers that he owned). Everything worked like clockwork without him. What more could you want?

But Mineev, who adored the “movement” (that’s how he put it), became sick and bored in calm England. And he started drinking. They say that he is the author of the famous joke about the fact that quitting drinking in difficult times for the country is stupid and mean. But this is more of a legend, but the fact that he usually started drinking in the morning is a fact.

In search of drive, he returned to his homeland. And by an evil irony of fate, it turned out that in 2014 Mineev was killed according to all the laws of the genre of those dashing 90s in which he survived...

There are several interesting details in the Mineev murder case: not a single one of the bullets fired from the Kalashnikov hit the driver. The billionaire himself died immediately, without suffering. And everything happened after Mineev’s assets and his real estate strangely passed into the hands of other people. Aerobatics, isn't it?

“And I would say that this is either a talented “multi-move” or a blunder in the work,” our analyst unexpectedly reveals. - What do I see in this situation? The professionalism of the shooting - yes, the professional work of the lawyers who changed the owners of Mineev's assets - yes. But a professionally committed murder is one that is not solved. Remember how they killed Shabtai Kalmanovich (a famous producer, owner of several markets. - Author's note). His car also slowed down at a traffic light, and the barrel of a machine gun also peered out from a neighboring car, a bunch of bullets hit the target. The driver also survived. But this matter is still pending. And for some reason it became known almost immediately about the “customer” Mineev. And in general, killing a person who is already screaming at the top of his lungs about the fact that his business was taken away from him is just unprofessionalism. It is clear that all those involved and suspects will soon “land” in a pre-trial detention center or be arrested in absentia. This is what we see in this particular case. This is no longer the murder of the former owner, but some kind of collective suicide of the raiders. And it turns out that all the work is in vain. And the deadlines ahead are enormous. Do you believe in such nonsense?

Conspiracy of the “GRU General”

One of the suspects in the crime, the general director of Mineev’s management company (it leased out all his real estate properties), Boris Karamatov, has been sitting in Butyrka for a year now. He was arrested on charges of murder (Article 105 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), but now the case is being reclassified as fraud (Article 159).

photo: vesti.ru

Boris agreed to an agreement with the investigation, says his lawyer Alexey Kapichnikov. - From the very beginning, he was ready to partially admit his guilt in fraud, since he handed over to the GRU general (by the way, no one could confirm that he really had this rank. - Author's note) Dmitry Kurylenko a list with the addresses of all objects real estate. But he had no idea how it could all end. From the very beginning, Kurylenko planned to open a restaurant and was looking for premises for this business. And Boris’s job responsibilities included communicating with potential tenants. That's how they met. Kurylenko told him that the restaurant should be grandiose - 3 thousand square meters. meters. And they found a room for it in the Mineev shopping center, located at the exit from Kutuzovsky Prospekt to Rublyovka. Later, having met Mineev personally, General Kurylenko seemed to offer Boris participation in the seizure of property. Karamatov’s role was limited to planting incriminating evidence against Mineev in his home and office, after which Mineev was to be arrested on false charges of financing terrorism and transported to the Republic of Dagestan, where he would most likely face “suicide.”

Boris Karamatov claims that he not only abandoned the idea (after learning that the matter smelled of “wetness”), but also honestly warned the boss about everything. After that, he allegedly even hid from the enraged Kurylenko in a rented apartment.

During the search of Mineev, the Dagestan police actually did not find any extremist literature. We left with nothing. However, very “with nothing” - they confiscated all the constituent documents of Mr. Mineev’s companies. And the real estate was still re-registered to dummies, and the money was transferred to offshore areas not controlled by the oligarch. This happened, among other things, according to investigators, thanks to the company’s lawyer, Yulia Egorova.

So, it turns out: General Kurylenko decided to rob the billionaire and resorted to the help of his employees, as well as the Dagestan police. What's wrong here?

Doesn’t it bother you that the Dagestani police did not find bags with Wahhabi literature and receipts with transfers to terrorist accounts on Mineev? - our crime “analyst” comments. - In such cases, security forces move forward only on command: they say, everything is already in its place, we can accept it. There are no surprises in such matters. And what happened, in my opinion, is this (as with the Boris Nemtsov case): the organizers and performers decided to switch roles. Underestimating Caucasians, they often try to attract them only as brute force; but they pull up their people and strive from simple killers to turn into “owners”, so to speak, to become the first violin in this orchestra. This is a rake that many have stepped on. In this case, since no terrorist literature was found, it means that the organizers were afraid that the southerners would pull the entire raider “blanket” onto themselves, and did not want the billionaire to disappear forever. In general, it is more expensive to engage in joint raiding with the Dagestan security forces. No “customers” will get anything later. Apparently, they came to their senses. And that’s why they changed their minds about “showing” the bag with prohibited books.

Wiretapping Berezovsky's son-in-law

Many believe that GRU General Kurylenko is not the true customer. Moreover, the Investigative Committee itself mentions completely different probable authors of the crime - Shupp and Nekrich.

According to investigators, it may have been like this: Kurylenko realized that he could not organize a raider seizure of property himself, and turned to his friend, a businessman with a dubious dark past, Mikhail Nekrich. And he decided to involve his friend Georgy Shuppe, the husband of Boris Berezovsky’s daughter Ekaterina. Shuppe and Nekrich, hoping for a big jackpot, allocated as much as $6 million to carry out the operation to register Mineev’s property. The money went mainly to lawyers, tax officials and to pay lawyers. Now Shuppe and Nekrich are wanted and arrested in absentia. And again the question is: what is wrong here?

Question: why did these people need the billionaire’s corpse after he reported to the police about the seizure of his property? - our “analyst” comments. - After all, it is obvious that in this case everything taken will be arrested, and they will not be able to use this good. When they developed the plan, they hoped that Mineev would not come to his senses soon - he was a heavy drinker and seriously ill with diabetes, with gangrene (according to my information, he was not a resident at all). I don't think he would have realized it himself. Someone helped him find out everything in time, someone advised him to urgently contact the authorities and have the stolen property seized. This someone might not have discussed the problem directly with Mineev. It was enough to contact the same top manager Boris, intimidate him with some criminal case and offer to “fix everything” - urgently report the situation to the boss. Who is this someone? Think about it. It is obvious that he was aware of the entire situation. Obviously, he did not want to lose his fortune, which he may have had his own plans for.

I'm starting to think. If you think about Boris Karamatov, then only a person from the security forces could intimidate him. And Berezovsky’s son-in-law could have “led” him to him, without wanting to do so. After all, Schuppe and other former close associates of BAB are under the strictest control of the “federals.” Now imagine: for example, from wiretapping certain telephone conversations, some high-ranking security officials learn about plans for a raider seizure of Mineev’s property. But they decide not to interfere. Bye. They let it happen. They do not allow Mineev to be taken to Dagestan, they inform him that he was robbed (so that he can contact the authorities and the stolen property cannot disappear without a trace). But what next? It is obvious that Mineev, even as a sign of gratitude, will not give all his property to benefactors. And here, logically, it really makes sense to remove it beautifully.

“You are reasoning correctly,” the analyst tells me. - But by whose hands do they kill? I think it could be like this. The Caucasians got nothing from Mineev. They realized that they had been "taken for a ride." And then it was decided to demonstratively bang him. “Don’t let anyone get you.” So that this doesn’t happen in the future, when they are involved in an operation and then replay something.

This whole combination (they received information about the impending crime, observed, and at the moment of climax skimmed off the cream) is the old and reliable style of the security forces. You can find out who has left the service and disappeared from view since the murder. Although you are unlikely to succeed. This means that the name will remain unnamed. Perhaps this person was already planning to resign from the authorities at that time. While he was serving, there seemed to be no need for him to get involved in such matters. But since you’re leaving soon and there won’t be such great operational information anymore, then you can do a profitable business, so to speak, the last, most important thing, the work of your whole life.

A source in the special services did not deny that their person seemed to have been “spotted” in the Mineev case. Management allegedly found out about this, and the person was fired without fanfare. But what was it really like?

Where is the money, Zin?

When notary Alexei Solovyov, who was in charge of Mineev’s inheritance case, announced to his heirs that there was NOTHING, they were shocked. Soloviev did not find any property that was registered in the billionaire’s name, except for three used cars. And so - no shopping centers, no bank accounts, no apartments, no houses. The oligarch's relatives reasonably asked questions: where is the money?! Law enforcement agencies carefully responded: they say that the cunning Mineev hid everything in offshore companies. But what about seized real estate transferred to fake people? What with her? No answer.

And this is what the defender of top manager Boris Karamatov told us (and sent a letter to the State Duma):

The investigation continues to keep my client under arrest, since only Karamatov has complete information about Mineev’s offshore accounts and the intricate structure of his holding. Interested parties appoint a management company close to them and continue to collect rental payments of US$3 million per month. There is a clear interest in keeping all the property under arrest for as long as possible, and in keeping the person who has the information and could help the heirs assume their legal rights in a pre-trial detention center.

By the way, it has long seemed suspicious to me: why is Karamatov being “hidden” in the isolation ward for so long? After all, they recognized that he was not the customer or the organizer. But now everything comes together...

Mineev has three children. The eldest son Vsevolod seemed to want to compete for the inheritance, but then changed his mind. I tried to contact him, but friends said that he feared for his life. He only flew to Russia from the UK once, but did not even leave the airport building (he was interviewed right there by investigators from the Investigative Committee for the Moscow Region). I think nothing really threatens him, but someone needs to make him sure of the opposite. In general, it seems that he will not take part in the division of Mineev’s inheritance.

Recently, out of nowhere, a certain girl Valeria appeared, declaring that Mineev was the father of her young child. She submitted an application to the notary to recognize the child as an heir. Whether she did this out of naivety, or at someone’s evil instigation, is unknown. But I don’t think she’ll get anything (except maybe those three used cars).

The real initiators of this whole gangster story, of course, will remain in the shadows. They will imprison only the performers, and the whole story will soon be forgotten. Do you think the state or heirs will receive even a tiny share of a billion dollars? Here is the latest leak in the media from law enforcement: Mineev allegedly had no assets even abroad. Checkmate The grandmasters certainly played one of the best games (pardon the pun) of recent times.

Eva Merkacheva

In the case of the murder of the founder of the "Party" only swindlers remained

The investigation into the raider seizure of real estate valued at $1 billion has been completed.

As it became known to "", an unexpected turn occurred in the investigation of the murder of the founder and owner of the Party chain of household appliances stores, Alexander Mineev. At the final stage of the proceedings, the Main Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee for the Moscow Region divided this high-profile case into two: the alleged participants in the theft of Mr. Mineev’s real estate, estimated at $1 billion, will go to trial, and those accused of organizing and executing the murder ended up in another case, the investigation of which is ongoing.

49-year-old owner of the Party household appliances store, Alexander Mineev, was killed in Korolev near Moscow on January 22, 2014. Almost from the very beginning of the investigation, the main investigative department of the Investigative Committee for the Moscow Region adhered to the version that the murder was connected with the raider seizure of Mr. Mineev’s real estate. By this time, the entrepreneur owned premises in 21 shopping centers in Moscow and St. Petersburg, in which he stopped trading, considering it unprofitable, and decided to rent out 110 thousand square meters. m of space for rent. At that time, their value was estimated at $1 billion.

The property, as the investigation established, was registered in the name of 18 LLCs, which were managed by offshore companies in Belize and the Seychelles - Orange Cap, Milky Cap, Black Cap and Brown Cap Ltd. And their founder, in turn, was another offshore company - Crazy Dragon. The income received was accumulated in the accounts of the management company Eurasia LLC, which Alexander Mineev also owned through an offshore company.

Having organized a new business, Alexander Mineev left for the UK, leaving Boris Karamatov, who headed Eurasia LLC, on the farm.

The idea to take possession of Alexander Mineev’s billion-dollar fortune, according to investigators, came to former paratrooper Dmitry Kurylenko. He met the entrepreneur, introducing himself to him as a general of the SVR and inviting him to open a restaurant on Kutuzovsky Prospekt. And when he became interested in the project, he suggested to his friend Boris Karamatov to steal the constituent documents of all 18 LLC of the entrepreneur. According to the defense, Mr. Karamatov refused to participate in the raider takeover and even resigned from the post of general director of Eurasia; nevertheless, he became one of the central figures in the investigation.

His successor Yulia Egorova agreed to do this for him, to whom Mr. Kurylenko informed that Alexander Mineev’s real estate was expected to be taken under control by Boris Berezovsky’s son-in-law Georgy Shuppe, who lives in Switzerland, and Israeli businessman Mikhail Nekrich. According to investigators, the woman agreed to re-register the property to third parties for a fee of several million dollars. Dmitry Kurylenko, who expected to conclude a pre-trial agreement on cooperation, subsequently informed investigators of the Main Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation about this. He was eventually denied the deal, after which Mr. Kurylenko refused to testify. But the investigation gave way to his first confessions.

According to the Main Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation, upon returning from London, Alexander Mineev learned about the raider seizure and appealed to law enforcement agencies and arbitration courts. In response, the organizers of the raider seizure in 2013 reported to law enforcement agencies that Alexander Mineev’s structures allegedly financed militants: they even planted a fake seal of Eurasia LLC in the pocket of the clothes of one of the destroyed members of the illegal armed formation. However, the searches that Dagestani security forces conducted in the same year in the offices of Mr. Mineev did not yield any results. In any case, the businessman avoided the arrest that the raiders were counting on.

Then, according to the testimony of Dmitry Kurylenko, Mikhail Nekrich suggested that he “remove” Mr. Mineev. However, he refused, after which another performer was found - a native of Dagestan, Omar Suleymanov. It was he, according to investigators, who shot at an SUV with a businessman from a machine gun in Korolev.

Having understood the circumstances of the high-profile crime, the Main Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee for the Moscow Region identified from the main case the persons involved in fraud (Part 4 of Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) and those involved in the murder of the businessman. The charges of fraud in the final version were brought against Dmitry Kurylenko, Boris Karamatov, Yulia Egorova, lawyer Kamil Kaziev (in arbitrations, he withdrew Mr. Mineev’s claims and re-registered his property to a third party) and the general director of one of the offshore companies, Boris Prokopenko. Let us note that initially Messrs. Kurylenko and Karamatov were also charged with involvement in the murder of an entrepreneur, but the most serious charge against them was eventually dropped. Now they are all familiarizing themselves with the materials of the 40-volume case of fraud, which, after completion of the procedure, will be sent to the prosecutor for approval, and then to the court.

At the same time, Mikhail Nekrich, Georgy Shuppe, ex-CEO of Eurasia Satrudin Bagaudinov and Omar Suleymanov, who, according to investigators, were involved in both the murder of Mr. Mineev and the raider seizure of his assets, found themselves in a case whose investigation is ongoing. All of them are wanted. The investigation found that the motive for the murder of the founder of the Party was his opposition to real estate fraud.

Yuri Senatorov

No arrests remain in $1 billion theft case

Rosbalt, September 16, 2016

All those accused in the case of the murder of tycoon Alexander Mineev have been released. Their detention periods have expired.

One of the most notorious crimes of recent years remains unsolved. The prospects that the accused will ever appear in court are dim.

As a source familiar with the situation told Rosbalt, the accused (former GRU officer Dmitry Kurylenko, lawyer Kamil Kaziev and ex-general director of Eurasia LLC Boris Karamatov) have expired their detention periods. This week they were released; they were given a written undertaking not to leave as a preventive measure. The investigation period expires on September 22 and will be extended. However, the prospects that the materials will go to court seem extremely vague. In February 2016, the Main Investigative Directorate of the Russian Federation for the Moscow Region submitted indictments for approval to the Prosecutor General's Office for subsequent submission to court. However, the supervisory agency considered that the investigation made many mistakes in dividing the materials, during the investigation itself, and in qualifying the actions of the defendants. In this regard, the prosecutor's office did not approve the indictment and transfer the materials to the court. They were returned to the Main Investigative Directorate of the Russian Federation for the Moscow Region.

“In the form in which the case came to the prosecutor’s office, it was impossible to consider it in court, it would simply “fall apart.” Moreover, there were many “gaps”: it was not established, in particular, whether Mineev alone owned this real estate or whether he had partners, whether he owned it at all, documents were not received from abroad, where all transactions with assets were formalized, etc. ...,” the agency’s interlocutor expressed his opinion. - Since February, little has changed in the case, so when the materials will appear in court and whether they will appear at all is unknown. It is also unknown whether the accused will remain in Russia by that time. The main defendants in the case, as is known, have been hiding abroad for a long time.”

At the end of 2015, several materials were separated from the general investigation into the murder of Alexander Mineev and the theft of his assets into separate proceedings. In particular, the case is against the ex-general director of Eurasia LLC (this company managed all of Mineev’s real estate) Boris Karamatov, who entered into a pre-trial agreement. He is charged under Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (fraud on an especially large scale). In addition, the Main Investigative Directorate of the Russian Federation for the Moscow Region (MO) separated into separate proceedings the case against former GRU employee Dmitry Kurylenko, lawyer Kamil Kaziev (both are accused of fraud) and ex-lawyer Mineev Yulia Egorova (she was charged only with Article 201 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation - abuse of power). All the circumstances of the tycoon’s murder remained in the general investigation, the main defendants of which are Berezovsky’s son-in-law Georgy Shuppe, businessman Mikhail Nekrich (the Russian Investigative Committee considers them the “customers” of fraud and murder) and the “authority” Sadro Bagautdinov (the alleged organizer of the execution of Mineev).

According to the Main Investigative Directorate of the Russian Federation Investigative Committee for the Moscow Region, Boris Karamatov worked as the general director of Eurasia LLC, controlled by Mineev. This company accumulated all the proceeds from leasing space in 21 retail and office centers, which were believed to belong to the tycoon and were worth about $1 billion. Yulia Egorova, who was the nominee director of four offshore structures that owned 18 companies to which 21 buildings were registered. According to the agency’s source, Karamatov was repeatedly involved in dubious stories, which is why he used passports under three different surnames. So, in Eurasia LLC he was listed as Boris Khamitov.

According to investigators, Karamatov told his relative Dmitry Kurylenko that he knew the real estate ownership scheme of Mineev, who spends most of his time in England, so it was possible to seize 21 buildings. Kurylenko, as law enforcement officials believe, shared this information with his acquaintance, businessman Mikhail Nekrich, who lives in Israel. The operation of a raider attack on Mineev’s assets promised to be costly, so Nekrich decided to involve a friend in it - Boris Berezovsky’s son-in-law Georgy Shuppe, who settled in London. The latter could also have insider information: at one time, Berezovsky’s interests in London were represented by the same lawyers who acted on the side of Mineev’s wife during her divorce proceedings from her husband.

According to law enforcement agencies, Shuppe and Nekrich initially allocated about $3 million for the seizure of real estate (due to various problems, the amount of expenses later almost doubled). Of this, $500 thousand went to bribe Yulia Egorova. With the help of hired lawyers, bribing a number of officials, including Egorova, 18 Russian companies managed to change owners, and documents began to be prepared for the transfer of real estate to other structures. However, Mineev’s subordinates noticed the raiders’ manipulations when changing bank accounts. The tycoon turned to arbitration courts and law enforcement agencies, the seizure of real estate was on the verge of failure.

In January 2014, Mineev was killed by killers in Korolev, Moscow Region. Karamatov and Kurylenko were arrested in November 2014. During interrogations, they admitted that they were preparing to steal Mineev’s buildings, but categorically denied their guilt in the murder of the tycoon. Allegedly, the decision to eliminate him was made personally by Nekrich, who himself organized the crime.

Egorova is under house arrest throughout the investigation. In the summer of 2015, lawyer Kamil Kaziev, who was Mikhail Nekrich’s confidant in this whole story and was involved in legal processing of transactions with stolen companies, was detained.

Nekrich, Shuppe and Bagautdinov are wanted.

During the investigation, it became known that Mineev may have had a secret partner in real estate ownership - Konstantin Vankov, who was at the origins of the tycoon’s creation of the entire business. Moreover, documents have surfaced that, while abroad, Mineev sold his share in Russian assets to Vankov. However, the attackers, preparing the murder and raider seizure, did not know about this.

Yuri Vershov

Who captured"Party" assets

At the time of the murder, billionaire Alexander Mineev had already lost control over his companies

Irek Murtazin, special correspondent for Novaya Gazeta. February 3, 2017

Billionaire Alexander Mineev was shot dead on January 22, 2014. The businessman was traveling from his mansion in the village of Zagoryanka, Shchelkovsky district, to Moscow. In Korolev, on Tsiolkovsky Street, as soon as Mineev’s Range Rover stopped at a traffic light, an SUV slowed down on the right, a machine gun barrel appeared in the window, and shots rang out. Later, 27 shell casings were found inside the car abandoned by the killers. Mineev was hit by seven bullets. He died instantly. Neither the driver Vyacheslav Buganov nor any bystanders were injured. All the bullets landed in a cluster, precisely in the area of the front passenger seat. This speaks to the professionalism of the killer, who did not shoot from point-blank range, but apparently in short bursts while sitting in the back seat behind an accomplice driver. Despite the very inconvenient position for shooting, the Kalashnikov assault rifle did not “dance” in the hands of the killer.

Mineev did not leave a will. According to the law, four children and an elderly mother could claim his inheritance. But they got nothing. The businessman turned out to be a victim of a raider seizure of property. Mineev learned that his assets had been transferred to other owners on the eve of his death. And he began to desperately fight for the return of assets. I filed statements with law enforcement agencies and filed lawsuits in the courts. When, after Mineev’s death, eleven months after the fatal shots in Korolev, it was possible to return the assets to the enterprises that he controlled during his life, it turned out that the Hong Kong company Crazy Dragon International Limited, which was the ultimate beneficiary of all Mineev’s assets, had a new owner - a Panamanian FORUS Corporation.

Vertical takeoff

The story of Alexander Mineev is a story about the absolute defenselessness of Russian business. Even after earning a huge fortune, you can lose everything in one moment. And not because of ruin due to the economic crisis, erroneous management decisions or active actions of more successful competitors. Your assets can “float away” to other people with the help of false documents and the actions of managers whom you trusted infinitely. This is exactly what happened with Alexander Mineev, one of Russia’s first multimillionaires. Here's his story.

In the early 90s, Mineev founded the Party company, the country's first chain of stores selling household and office equipment. In 1997, “Party” grew into a chain of “Domino” stores, in which Mineev established trade in luxury furniture, clothing, shoes... The annual turnover of “Party” and “Domino” amounted to hundreds of millions of dollars.

In 2000, a successful businessman came under close attention from law enforcement agencies. A retired FSB officer, well familiar with the details of the confrontation between security forces for control over smuggling channels, which resulted in the famous “Three Whales” case, told Novaya that in the early 2000s, the Department of Economic Security became interested in the founder and owner of “Party” and “Domino”. FSB, at that time headed by Colonel General Yuri Zaostrovtsev. The general suspected that “Party” and “Domino” were understating customs payments, and Mineev was patronized by Boris Gutin. The same Gutin, who while still in the KGB of the USSR “oversaw” all foreign trade of the Soviet Union, in 1997–2000 headed the internal security department of the State Customs Committee of Russia (SCC), and in July 2000 was appointed deputy head of the SCC.

My interlocutor said that in 2001–2003, FSB operatives collected a wealth of materials about Alexander Mineev, including those confirming his informal contacts with the deputy head of the State Customs Committee Boris Gutin. And not only with him, but also with the generals of the FSB, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and the prosecutor's office. But either the evidence base for criminal prosecution was not enough, or Mineev’s patrons managed to get Mineev out of harm’s way, but he was not among the defendants in the high-profile criminal case of smuggling. Nevertheless, the businessman took the “Three Pillars” case as a serious warning and began to curtail business projects. In 2003, he closed the Domino chain of stores, in 2004 he sold Rost Bank at a profit, and in 2005, the Party company also ceased to exist.

Everyday life of a London rentier

Mineev began leasing retail space. In the 90s, when opening stores, the businessman immediately relied on acquiring real estate ownership.

By the beginning of the century, in Moscow alone, Mineev owned two dozen large retail facilities, including a shopping center and a car showroom at 88 on Kutuzovsky Prospekt (total area 13,423.7 sq.m.), a shopping center on Taganka (4,409.1 sq.m. ), warehouse terminals on Krasnogo Mayak Street (7909.7 sq.m.), shopping center "Europe" on Kaluzhskaya Square (5269.2 sq.m.). Mineev also owned real estate in other regions of Russia.

According to the most conservative estimates, the annual income from rental real estate was about 5 billion rubles.

Having established a system for leasing and collecting money for the use of retail premises, in 2005 Mineev moved to London.

Idle life abroad was not a joy. In addition, family relationships fell apart. Anticipating that things were heading towards divorce, and trying to minimize losses from the division of property, Mineev began to “hide” assets in offshore areas. And he began to tell everyone that in 2006 he retired and did not own any commercial real estate. Looking ahead, I will say that during the divorce proceedings, Mineev failed to convince the High Court of London of this. In his sworn testimony, Mineev stated: “When I left Russia in 2005, I retired. I closed my Russian enterprises. The economic and commercial climate in Russia was not very good, and I did not want to continue doing business there... My involvement in all companies ceased in 2005. Since I ceased trading, the property has been sold and I no longer own or rent it out..."

But the court did not believe the businessman, actually accusing him of committing crimes, including “giving false testimony to the court.” Judge Eleanor King, who considered case No. FD10F0051, after studying hundreds of documents and listening to dozens of witnesses, made a decision in November 2013, in paragraph 243 of which she wrote that Mineev had evaded paying taxes for many years, both in Russia and in the UK, that he “keeps complete control of his business empire”, that Mineev’s employee Konstantin Vankov regularly came to London to receive instructions regarding enterprises controlled by Mineev. The High Court of London also calculated Mineev’s income from leasing that part of the real estate in Russia, the ownership of which to Mineev was left in no doubt by the court. At paragraph 258, Judge Eleanor King stated that Mineev “... clearly concealed his assets. In terms of income, he no doubt receives significant income from property in Russia, estimated by Knight Frank in November 2012 at US$18,115,714 per annum in rental income."

“Zeroing” Mineev

Mineev could not help but understand that false testimony to a court in Britain is a crime fraught with a serious prison sentence. Perhaps that is why, in the midst of the divorce proceedings, he left London and returned to Moscow. And he became actively involved in managing his assets. He thoroughly shook up the staff, fired many managers, recruited new ones...

By that time, all real estate was registered under eighteen LLCs established by offshore companies from Belize and the Seychelles: OrangeCap Ltd, MilkyCap Ltd, BrownCap Ltd and CepCap Ltd. The sole shareholder of the Seychelles and Belizean companies was the Hong Kong company Crazy Dragon International Limited, the ultimate beneficiary of which was Alexander Mineev. Operational management of the property was carried out by Eurasia LLC.

In December 2013, the Central Bank revoked the license of the bank in which accounts of Mineev enterprises were opened. To open accounts in another bank, an extract from the Federal Tax Service was required. But when Mineev turned to the tax office for documents, he was surprised to learn that in all eighteen LLCs in which the real estate was registered, both the founders and management had changed. The founders and managers of offshore companies have changed in a similar way. Mineev appealed to the Ministry of Internal Affairs with a statement about the theft of assets. The lawyers prepared documents to start trials and even managed to file claims with the Moscow Arbitration Court and seize the property so that it would not be resold to “bona fide purchasers.” But the matter did not come to consideration of the claims. On January 22, 2014, Mineev was shot, and soon the arbitration claims were withdrawn and the arrests on real estate transactions were lifted.

The Moscow Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs opened criminal case No. 1627 about the theft of Mineev’s assets only a month after his death. And on the day when machine gun fire was heard in Korolev, the ICR department for the Moscow region opened criminal case No. 106556 into the murder of Mineev. On April 23, both cases were combined into one proceeding.

The investigation was led by Colonel Stanislav Antonov, an investigator for particularly important cases of the Main Investigations Directorate of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation for the Moscow Region.

And although in the criminal case, almost in the first weeks of the investigation, suspects, those arrested, and those put on the wanted list appeared, today, three years after the execution of Mineev, all the arrested persons involved in the criminal case were released from the pre-trial detention center, the case never came to trial , in September last year, investigator Antonov “left” this case.

Antonov handed over almost one and a half hundred volumes of collected materials to another investigator. He began his work by canceling Antonov’s decision to recognize Mineev’s children as victims in a criminal case...

Panama trail

The Hong Kong company Crazy Dragon International Limited was established on February 24, 2012. In December 2014, the company changed its owner, and on November 13, 2015, the new owner liquidated it. After liquidation, all assets were transferred to the same Panamanian company FORUS Corporation, headed by Alexander Shibakov. Another director of FORUS Corporation since August 2010 was Alexander Kaledin. I can assume that it is only due to an unfortunate misunderstanding that Shibakov and Kaledin are not included in the list of the hundred richest Russians compiled annually by Forbes magazine.

Shibakov and Kaledin also have a Russian company with a similar name - Forus Group LLC. But back on June 24, 2014, when investigator Antonov officially interrogated Shibakov, when filling out the title page of the interrogation protocol, in the “place of work” column, he indicated: “Crazy Dragon, director.” And during interrogation he testified: “In February 2014, I learned from my friend lawyer Vedenin that he was acting as a lawyer for the injured party in a high-profile criminal case, namely the murder of Mineev. Then I studied this issue from open sources of information. While studying this issue, I learned that all the disputed property belongs to the Hong Kong company Crazy Dragon. After this, I instructed my Chinese lawyers to study this issue... with the aim of acquiring the assets of this organization.”

The interrogation protocol, a copy of which is at the disposal of the editorial office, indicates Shibakov’s mobile phone number. I called it. Lawyer Vadim Vedenin answered me. We agreed to meet.

When I arrived at the address indicated by Vedenin, it turned out that this was the office center of the Forus Group company. At the entrance to the negotiation room there is a poster with the slogan: “True greatness is built on the awareness of one’s strength, while false greatness is built on the awareness of the weakness of others.” And the signature is “FORUSGROUP”. Vedenin, having escorted me to the negotiation room, returned a few minutes later with two more men. He introduced them as his colleagues, but did not name them. The “colleagues” themselves refused to introduce themselves... After the end of the conversation with the Forus Group employees, having described my interlocutors, I learned that one of them was Alexander Kaledin. Having asked to listen to an audio recording of a conversation between people who were personally acquainted with Kaledin, I became convinced that Vedenin’s “colleague”, with whom he returned to the negotiation room, was Kaledin. And it was he who became the main participant in the conversation. Lawyer Vedenin and the third participant in the meeting remained mostly silent, only occasionally adding or clarifying something.

Alexander Kaledin spoke assertively and confidently. Fluently operated with dates, figures, facts. He said that at the time of Mineev’s murder, all his assets had already been stolen.

It was we who achieved the return of assets that the Crazy Dragon company had unconditionally owned since 2012. Then it is stolen from her. By forging documents, falsifications... - said Kaledin. - We were the first to start fighting for the return of assets. We succeeded in sending 300 parliamentary requests asking for an investigation. Not to find good or bad, but to investigate. 150 trials took place, 700 court orders were received, and only after that it was possible to return all the Crazy Dragon companies.

And it is true. Vadim Vedenin, who entered the case as a lawyer for Mineev’s mother Alla Arkadyevna, really made a lot of efforts to return the assets. But now it turns out that he actually worked in the interests of the murdered man’s mother only until the summer of 2014. Then work began in the interests of the new owners of Crazy Dragon - the Panamanian company FORUS Corporation.

But did Mineev own the Crazy Dragon company? - Kaledin asked, continuing the conversation. - No, I didn’t own it. The beneficiary of the company from the moment of registration was Konstantin Vankov (already mentioned as an employee of Mineev - I.M.). We studied it very critically, we wrote a lot of statements, we suspected that it was Vankov who organized the theft. Until we were convinced that he was the owner, we did not conduct any negotiations with him...

And it was from Vankov, according to Kaledin, that Shibakov purchased Crazy Dragon, paying an amount with six zeros...

But there is an interrogation protocol dated March 20, 2014, during which Vankov testified that the owner of Crazy Dragon is Alexander Mineev,” I clarified. - Vankov told in great detail how he registered Crazy Dragon on Mineev’s instructions.

Do you know that, upon leaving the interrogation, Vankov immediately went to the airport and left Russia? - retorted Kaledin, according to whom investigator Antonov forced Vankov to give precisely such testimony.

Kaledin's version does not resemble the truth. If only because Vankov did not leave Russia immediately after the interrogation. The interrogation on March 20 was preceded by a February interrogation, during which Vankov told the same thing. And in March I only clarified some details.

Having left Russia, Konstantin Vankov in December 2014 sent the investigator a “Declaration” that it was he who founded the Hong Kong company Crazy Dragon International Limited on February 24, 2012 and until November 2014 was the sole beneficiary of the company, and in November 2014 he ceded everything rights of the Panamanian company FORUS Corporation represented by Alexander Shibakov.

What or who made Vankov “remember” that he was the owner of the Crazy Dragon company?

Read the answer to this question in the next issues of Novaya.

RIGHT OF RESPONSE

Lawyer Vedenin’s response to the Novaya Gazeta article “Who Seized the Party’s Assets”

Having studied the creation of Novaya Gazeta special correspondent Irek Murtazin, I decided that for an objective picture I would present a kind of review of the published material.

I would like to immediately make a reservation that I categorically disagree with the author’s version and the presentation of the material to readers. You can start with the title of the publication - “Who seized the assets of the Party.” After reading the article, I did not find an answer to it, even in the author’s interpretation. And yet this is not even a question, but a statement. That is, the author is already convinced that there was some kind of capture.

On the one hand, there really was a seizure, which was confirmed in the materials of criminal case No. 106556, investigated by the Main Investigation Department of the Investigative Committee for the Moscow Region. This seizure has specific perpetrators who have been charged and who admit their guilt in fraudulent activities, as well as individuals who have also been charged with similar charges, but who have not admitted guilt. There are also persons who have been charged in absentia due to the fact that they are hiding from the investigative authorities. However, all these specific defendants who are awaiting trial do not arouse the interest of Novaya Gazeta special correspondent Irek Murtazin.

The text of the article under review contains information about other persons who, in the author’s opinion, seized the assets of the “Party”. I draw your attention to this, not the accused who have confessed and are awaiting trial, but other persons! But let's get back to this a little later.

Let's try to understand what facts or events the author analyzed before coming to such conclusions. And here for me, as a person who is somewhat familiar with the events of the crimes, questions immediately arise about the competence of the source who advised the correspondent.

Let's start with the fact that the execution in Korolev was carried out not from an SUV, but from a Hyundai Accent sedan with transit license plates, which was discovered a few days later not far from the scene of the execution. This information was shown on a number of central television channels and covered in some detail in the media, but for some reason the author is confused here. Further in the article there is a statement that the heirs of the murdered man received nothing. I, as a person who represented the interests of the mother of the murdered man in an inheritance and criminal case, am well aware that the inheritance estate included several apartments in Moscow, a plot of land in the village of Zagoryansky, Moscow region with a large house and several non-residential buildings, some amounts of money for personal accounts of the murdered man. In addition, after the death of my confidant, the children of the murdered man also received a three-room apartment in Moscow, two dachas in the Moscow region and a little later three exclusive apartments in Moscow in an elite luxury residential complex, which, by court decision, were to be returned to the murdered man after their alienation in favor of the ex-wife (materials of criminal case No. 749321 on the application of Alexander Mineev in relation to Irina Mineeva on the fact of fraudulent actions). And this is only the property that went to the children of the murdered person after his death and the death of his mother. Separately, we can mention English property, and these are three luxury apartments and a three-story house in London, worth several tens of millions of pounds sterling, which went to Mineev’s ex-wife and his children as a result of divorce proceedings.

It’s very ugly to count other people’s money, but I couldn’t not show it to the reader, who after reading the text might get the impression that Mineev’s children and his ex-wife were starving somewhere in a Khrushchev building on the outskirts of Moscow.

But let's return to the text of the article. The author claims that having learned about the raider seizure (which is unclear who committed it, but this is not important for the author at the moment), Mineev began to desperately fight for the return of assets and even filed a statement with law enforcement agencies and the courts.

It should be noted here that Mineev never wrote any statements, and could not write them, because has never been a person who, within the meaning of the current criminal procedure law, could have suffered property damage by fraudulent actions aimed at taking possession of commercial real estate. Moreover, Alexander Mineev always indicated in his explanations to both Russian and English law enforcement agencies that he sold his business in 2005 and moved to live in the UK, therefore he is neither the owner of the trust nor a person who may have any property rights. claims to real estate.

The statements were written by foreign companies whose shares in the authorized capital were illegally alienated and which the investigative authorities did not want to recognize as victims for almost three years. These same companies were the initiators of arbitration cases, as a result of which two years later, the property returned to the original owners and who still have it today. This is an important clarification, because Murtazin’s statement about the emergence of a new owner, the Panamanian company Forus Corporation, is, to say the least, misinformation. There have been no new owners of the property since 2012.

Further chapters of the publication about vertical takeoff and the everyday life of the London rentier, although they contain unconfirmed figures and facts, allegedly from the life of Alexander Mineev, but in our opinion, do not require detailed analysis, because do not in any way reveal the main thesis of the article, indicated in its title.

It is worth paying attention to only one significant point, which, it seems to us, makes Murtazin’s version that Mineev began to hide property offshore when he felt that things were heading towards divorce completely untenable.

The fact is that the first foreign companies in the corporate structure of the former retail space of the Domino Party group of companies appeared in 2005, and the divorce of the Mineevs took place in Moscow on March 3, 2009, while Alexander Mineev himself learned about it even later, already when his wife, who declared in Moscow that she had no property claims, decided to make a division of property in London, where they both lived at that time. The divorce itself in Moscow took place in secret from Alexander, which he told the English court: “I agree with the dates of the divorce in Russia and with the fact that I did not participate in this process and was not represented in it. I was not given notice of the lawsuit, nor was I notified of a hearing date. I first became aware of the divorce proceedings in May 2010 when I was served with notice of a District Court proceeding which Irina had commenced here...of course Irina knew that I lived in London and where I lived there. She could easily have told me about the application to the Moscow court for divorce, the date of the hearing, etc..., but she did not. It seems wrong to me that someone is being scammed in secret, especially when the person initiating the trial knew exactly where I was but did not tell me about it...” (paragraph 30).

Irina Mineeva is further characterized by the following testimony from her ex-husband: “I saw Irina...somewhere in March 2010. She invited me to dinner at her flat in Eaton Place and I came. Several of our mutual friends and our sons were there. The evening was very pleasant. I met her under other circumstances when we were both out in public; for example, in shops and restaurants.”

That is, Irina has already secretly divorced her husband, but for all their mutual friends, their children and Alexander himself, they are still a friendly family having fun. Meanwhile, Irina, with the help of London lawyers, is preparing a lawsuit against her unsuspecting and now ex-husband. During the divorce proceedings, Irina managed to quarrel between her ex-husband and their common children, with whom Alexander still maintained relations. But after Irina Mineeva tried to serve Alexander with court documents through her children in mid-2011, he stopped all contact with both her and her sons.

But let’s leave the moral (or immoral) side of the issue outside the scope, because It would be wrong to delve into the “dirty laundry” by examining the question posed by the author of the article “Who seized the assets of the Party”, probably wrong...

It will be difficult for Russian practicing lawyers to understand some of the features and style of presentation of the plot of the case in the judicial acts of the London Court. For example, why if, as the author claims, the court, having accused Alexander Mineev of crimes (giving false testimony to the court, tax evasion for many years), nevertheless did not initiate a single criminal case against him and did not bring him to justice?

Describing further events related to the beginning of the raider seizure, the author still does not focus on who committed it, although the defendants, as stated above, have been identified and brought to justice. Is it because he would like to blame completely different people, and those who admitted to committing fraud seem to have nothing to do with it in Murtazin’s version?

Apparently yes. Because further, the author, avoiding important details about by whom and for whom the Crazy Dragon company was created and under what transaction it sold its assets, claims that after its liquidation everything went to the Panamanian Forus Corporation.

Having studied in detail the available documents on transactions provided to the investigation, as a result of which foreign companies, and not the heirs, were recognized as victims of fraudulent actions, we can assert that the transfer of rights to shares of Crazy Dragon began and ended before the start of the process of its liquidation.

Apparently Irek Murtazin writes about this deal in the final part of the article entitled “The Panama Trail.” Analyzing the protocol of interrogation of Shibakov, Vankov and our meeting with him, the journalist comes to the conclusion that, apparently, he uncovered some kind of conspiracy..., the participants of which forced Vankov to “remember” that he was the owner of the Crazy Dragon company.

What prompted Irek Murtazin to do this, as he himself writes, was that he discovered the Russian company Forus Group LLC (whose tax identification number he did not indicate, which is a pity, because I was unable to find such a legal entity in the tax database), poster with the signature “FORUSGROUP” at the entrance to the meeting room (it’s good that we were not in the room where the poster with the heroes of the Cuban revolution hangs), and two interlocutors who refused to introduce themselves to the journalist, citing the fact that he was obviously biased in writing his article. Assessing one of the interlocutors, the special correspondent of Novaya Gazeta admires his confidence, assertiveness and ability to operate with dates, figures, facts, and also compliments me, appreciating that a lot of effort has indeed been made to return the assets.

However, for some reason, he immediately comes to the conclusion that I defended the interests of Alla Arkadyevna Mineeva only until the summer of 2014, and then switched to the new owners - the Panamanian company Forus Corporation, which haunts Murtazin. Of course, I was offended to read this. But on the other hand, I attribute this to the fact that they simply forgot to tell Mutnazin that from May 2014 to October 2016. I went through all the authorities right up to the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation, where I was able to prove that until the death of my trustee in October 2015, I conscientiously defended her interests in the criminal case and was able to achieve some important results during the investigation.

Again, the correspondent’s contradictory conclusions about the new owners, while he himself recognized my merits in returning the property to the old owners, can only mean his lack of information. And Murtazin’s completely unfounded assertions that Vankov did not leave Russia after his interrogation in March 2014 are shattered by the copy of Vankov’s foreign passport with marks of border crossing that I have.

The author of the “investigation” does not consider it important to inform readers about the subsequent statements and interrogation of Vankov, who indicates that he was subjected to psychological violence by investigator Antonov and, under his pressure, was forced to give primary testimony. In addition, apparently, Konstantin Vankov’s fears regarding his safety after the murder of his long-term business partner should be considered insignificant. Apparently, the journalist believes that Vankov should have said immediately after the murder of Mineev: “I should have been in his place”!

I would like to thank Irek Murtazin for his attempt to objectively understand the material, but ask that in his future “revelations” he still proceed more from facts, rather than from versions and rumors. For our part, we are ready for any form of objective dialogue in order to dispel all speculation regarding our role in this story.

Candidate of Physics and Mathematics, Actual State Advisor of the Russian Federation 3rd class. Executive secretary and member of the bureau of the Expert Council of the International Affairs Committee of the Federation Council of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation, member of the scientific expert council under the Chairman of the Federation Council of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation, member of the expert council of AK Transneft OJSC.

After graduating from the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology in 1973, he worked at the Institute of Chemical Physics of the USSR Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Molecular Biology of the USSR Academy of Sciences, Moscow State University. M.V. Lomonosov. In 1979 he defended his dissertation for the degree of candidate of physical and mathematical sciences. Since 1987, he has been a freelance writer for the Moscow News newspaper, since 1989, a columnist, and from 1990 to 1992, editor of the international relations department of MN, the first department of such a thematic focus in the Soviet press. From 1992 to 1996, founder and editor-in-chief of the scientific and journalistic magazine “Your Choice,” focused on the problems of Russian regions.

In 1996–98 - Advisor, Head of the Public Relations Department in the regions of the Public Relations Office of the President of Russia. In 1998-99 Head of the Department of Ethnopolitical and Socio-Economic Monitoring of the Ministry of Regional and National Policy of the Russian Federation. In 1999−2000 - political commentator for RIA Novosti. In 2000 - head of the analytical department of the Central Social Research Center (“Gref Foundation”).

In 2000–03 deputy head, head of the department for interaction with public organizations, political parties and the media in the office of the Plenipotentiary Representative of the President of the Russian Federation in the Volga Federal District.

In 2004–05 - Deputy Director of the Department of State Policy - Head of the Department of Interethnic Relations of the Ministry of Culture and Mass Communications of the Russian Federation.

In 2006–07 - Head of the analysis and planning department of the regional work department in the Central Executive Committee of the United Russia party.

Since 2004, he has been teaching part-time at the Department of Political Theory. In accordance with the approved plan, he conducts courses:

"Political Management";
“Psychology of business communication”;
“Visualization of a political campaign”;
"Speechwriting";
"Political and business communications."

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