MOSCOW, May 6 (RAPSI, Oleg Sivozhelezov) – The Moscow City Court has ruled that extension till June 27 of the attachment of property belonging to Irina and Ilya Khoroshavin, the spouse and son of Alexander Khoroshavin, who stands charged with large-scale embezzlement, was lawful, a RAPSI correspondent reports from the courtroom on Friday.

Thus, the Moscow City Court has dismissed a complaint against the decision of the Moscow Basmanny Court lodged by the Khoroshavins’ lawyers.

The lawyer of ex-governor’s spouse maintained that investigators had missed the deadline for petitioning the extension of attachment and stressed that some part of the seized property had been acquired yet in 2009, whereas, according to investigators, Khoroshavin started to commit crimes in 2011.

“Investigators failed to present convincing evidence that the sized property of third parties had been purchased at the expense of funds Khoroshavin obtained by crime,” – the lawyer said.

In the respective complaint, Ilya Khoroshavin’s lawyer noted that when his client had been questioned as a witness he stated that he had own sources of income and was not dependent on his father. 

In the course of the debate, the prosecutor insisted that the circumstances the investigator in the case described in the petition requesting to extend the attachment of property were correct and standing, and therefore the ruling of the Moscow Basmanny Court was not subject to reversal.

The Prosecutor General’s Office has filed a lawsuit with the Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk Court to take over the entire property registered to the former governor, his wife and son, which is estimated at 1.1 billion rubles ($16.4mn).
Last September, Irina Khoroshavina filed for divorce and division of property.

Investigators announced in March 2015 that Khoroshavin and several other officials were arrested for allegedly taking a $5.6 million bribe to secure a contract to build a power unit for the Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk thermal plant.

Last April, Khoroshavin was charged in another criminal case with taking a bribe of at least 15 million rubles ($194,500) for providing credits on advantageous terms to one of the local businessmen. He pleaded not guilty.

In January, the third criminal case was opened against Khoroshavin. According to investigators, he took 27 million rubles ($350,000) in bribes from candidates for the positions in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk City Duma in 2014.

President Vladimir Putin dismissed Khoroshavin from his post due to “loss of trust” in March 2015.