MOSCOW, July 12 (RAPSI) - The Presnensky District Court in Moscow has extended the house detention of Tamara Polyanitsyna, senior vice-president of Rosbank, a suspected accomplice of former Rosbank head Vladimir Golubkov, who has been accused of commercial bribery, RAPSI reports from the courtroom on Friday.
The court has thereby upheld the investigators' request to extend Polyanitsyna's detention until October 16.
During the hearing, her attorneys sought to negotiate for the easing of the terms of her house arrest and for her to be allowed to regularly visit her disabled father and elderly mother. The lawyer also asked for her to be allowed to do more for her daughter who has a disability and who is forced to remain in a restricted area due to the restrictions put on her mother. This situation is affecting her well-being, the lawyer argued.
The current conditions include a daily two-hour walk around the small plot of land surrounding Polyanitsyna's house. The lawyer asked the court to allow her to take walks with the child outside this area as well.
Meanwhile, the investigator asked the court to allow her to travel for questioning on her own because arranging her transfer from the Moscow Region is difficult. The court on Friday rejected the defense attorney's request to ease the restrictions placed on her but granted the investigator's request.
In May, the police arrested Golubkov, who had headed the bank since 2008, while he was accepting 5 million rubles ($160,000) as part of a larger $1.5 million kickback from the representative of a private company. The executive was allegedly trying to extort the money from Andrei Kovalyov, a former member of the Moscow city legislature and a rock musician, in order to restructure an $80 million debt.
The police believe Polyanitsyna was also involved in the deal. Both executives face fines of up to 70 times the size of the bribe and prison terms of up to seven years.
Rosbank is a private universal bank within the Societe Generale banking group. It provides banking services to private and corporate clients and has over 600 offices in 340 cities and towns across Russia. It is one of Russia's top 10 banks in terms of assets.