Russia Charges Governor, Pharma Exec in Major Bribery Case

The governor of Russia’s Penza area and a leading pharmaceutical exec have actually been charged in a large-scale bribery situation, Russia’s Investigative Committee claimed Monday.

Ivan Belozertsev, Biotek pharmaceutical team owner Boris Spiegel and also believed associates were detained over the weekend on suspicion of trading allurements for lobbying Biotek’s passions.

Detectives claimed Belozertsev approved money and also valuables worth over 31 million rubles ($ 415,245) from Spiegel, his other half Yevgenia Spiegel and Biotek director Anton Koloskov from January to September 2020.

In exchange, Biotek, among Russia’s biggest medicine vendors, allegedly got special preference for federal government agreements connected to the supply of drugs to Penza region medical care centers.

Belozertsev was bought to 2 months of pre-trial apprehension Monday.

If condemned, he deals with incompetency from holding public workplace for approximately 3 years, a fine as much as 100 times the quantity of the kickback and as much as 15 years behind bars. Spiegel as well as his affiliates face up to 12 years behind bars plus a great 70 times the quantity of the kickback.

Belozertsev, a dedicated ally of President Vladimir Putin from the pro-Kremlin United Russia event, was re-elected for a second term in 2014 and had actually gotten words of support from Putin himself prior to the gubernatorial race.

Belozertsev’s political condition had actually been unpredictable up until just recently, political researcher Rostislav Turovsky informed the RBC information web site. State-run polls placed him among the local heads running in last year’s race with the lowest appeal rankings.

” He waited the longest for authorization to participate in the elections and there was a really powerful unfavorable public relations war him,” Turovsky claimed. “Nevertheless, he held up.”

Turovsky called Belozertsev’s connection with Spiegel “a convenient pretext that can be used to release this case.”

” Belozertsev strove to maintain connections with all teams of impact, but obviously he wasn’t significant enough to be risk-free from being ousted,” he added.

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