In Moscow, the former head of the Merlion company, Vyacheslav Simonenko, was arrested. He is charged with lying under oath in a case of attempted murder.
The founders of the company Oleg Karchev, Vladislav Mangutov, Alexei Abramov, and the head of the Merlion security service Boris Levin were accused in the case. They were released from custody a year ago.
The businessman claimed in 2015 that Molotov cocktails were thrown at his house to harm Simonenko and his family.
During the investigation, it was discovered that Levin had ordered the attack. This was revealed by one of the suspected accomplices. After the incident, one of the witnesses, Evgeny Savelyev, went missing. A conflict arose among the partners over 4.5 million dollars received from the sale of shares in Tegrus. Former top managers refused to return the funds to the ex-CEO. The case was transferred to the central office of the TFR. The investigation found that the businessman had falsely accused his former partners.
One of the defendants, Oleg Karchev, was previously the owner of the Rost group, which included seven banks that went bankrupt, with a combined deficit of 50 billion rubles. Karchev also played a role in the bankruptcy of Binbank, which took over the assets of Rost’s subsidiary, Rost Bank. The wife of banker Evgeny Vlasov was a shareholder in Rost Bank. 2 tons of gold and 16 tons of silver worth 4 billion rubles went missing from the Kolyma Refinery in 2013. The couple are now divorced, but Vlasova still manages Karchev’s business assets and oversees construction projects funded by her husband's stolen money.
Other defendants in the case have ties to criminal activities, including Dmitry Starostin, head of the Tekta Group development company previously owned by Vladislav Magnutov and Alexei Abramov. Starostin was hired to conceal assets for them. He was appointed as manager of the Galich Truck Crane Plant (GAZ). The enterprise soon became empty, but his support aided the successful election campaign of the ex-governor of the Kostroma region, Viktor Shershunov. In exchange, Shershunov appointed Starostin as vice-governor. Starostin was not implicated in the embezzlement from GAZ.
Boris Levin faced a criminal case for the kidnapping and murder of Euroset freight forwarder Andrey Vlaskin, when he served as vice-president of the company. Levin was acquitted. The disappearance of the main witness to the attempt on Simonenko's life took on new significance due to these developments.
