MOSCOW, July 14 (RAPSI) – Moscow’s Basmanny District Court has ordered the detention of ex-deputy head of the Ministry of Emergency of Russia Andrey Gurovich on charges of abuse of power, the court’s press service has told RAPSI.

He will stay detained until September 11.

According to investigators, in 2020, the defendant organized allocation of more than 969 million rubles ($16.5 million) from the federal budget for the construction of a field hospital for patients suffering from coronavirus in the Murmansk region. The hospital was built without considering the region’s climate conditions. It was not used and later was demounted.

Knowing about these circumstances, Gurovich responsible for the expenditure control failed to take measures to effectively use the budget funds that resulted in the infliction of damage worth over 323 million rubles ($5.5 million) to the regional budget, the Investigative Committee stated.

If found guilty he could face up to 10 years behind bars.

Gurovich was appointed to the position of a deputy chief of the Emergency Ministry on June 4, 2018. This May he was fired by the order of President Vladimir Putin.