MOSCOW, October 22 (RAPSI) – Investigators have filed a motion with court seeking to seize gold found in a safe box washed off by a burst dike in a gold mine in Siberia’s Krasnoyarsk Region, the press service of Russia’s Investigative Committee reports.

A CEO of the gold-mining artel said about the gold during his interrogation. According to him, the safe box with gold was in one of the technical rooms destructed by flooding, the statement reads.

In the early hours of October 19, a technological dam burst in the gold mine, then broke four more and flooded several workers dormitories. As a result, 17 people died and several others are missing.

During the searches, investigators seized the artel’s documents. It was revealed that the dams were built illegally without permit in order to drain groundwater for the purpose of gold mining.

Three suspects were arrested and placed in detention for 2 months, including the owner of Sisim gold-mining artel Maxim Kovalkov, mine captain Andrey Yeganov and mine overseer Yevgeny Aleksandrov. Yeganov pleaded guilty and expressed wish to sign a plea deal, while Kovalkov and Aleksandrov denied their guilt.