A former criminal top manager of the Central Bank who fled Russia back in 2019 was arrested in absentia for a second time for safety.
The Tverskoy court of Moscow has arrested in absentia the former top manager of the Central Bank Dmitry Rubinov, who is on an international wanted list. Based in Israel, the ex-beneficiary of a number of bankrupt credit institutions is accused of embezzling more than 590 million rubles from the NKB bank.
A petition for the arrest in absentia of 45-year-old Dmitry Rubinov was filed with the Tverskoy court of the capital by an investigator of the Main Investigative Directorate of the Main Directorate of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs in Moscow, who is working on a criminal case of especially large-scale fraud (part. 4, Art. 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) with the funds of NKB Bank.
It was hard to believe that a defendant in a whole series of investigations of both economic and general criminal nature, and who had already been put on the international wanted list, would have a chance to avoid the strictest measure of restraint. The hearing itself took about three hours. Arguments of the parties, as it usually happens in such cases, turned out to be standard. After hearing them, Judge Anna Bazhenova sided with the investigation, authorizing the arrest of Dmitry Rubinov for two months from the moment of his detention in Russia or extradition from abroad.
According to Kommersant, the criminal case involving the ex-banker was initiated in June 2017 at the request of the Deposit Insurance Agency. Six months before that, the credit institution was stripped of its license due to a number of violations that posed “a real threat to the interests of creditors and depositors”. Its debt to the latter at the time of the collapse amounted to more than 1.5 billion rubles.
The first within the framework of the investigation launched in September 2017, Vladimir Kryshtop, head of the department for the development of the NKB’s banking network, was detained and sent to the pre-trial detention center at the request of the investigation. Later, charges of fraud were brought against ex-general director of NKB Sergey Lavrentiev and his advisor Mikhail Solodov. On October 9, 2023, Basmanniy District Court found all three guilty of embezzlement of Rb 590m from NKB, disguised as payment for promissory notes presented for repayment by a fictitious microcredit company under their control, ApexFinService (liquidated on July 16, 2020). They pulled off this fraud less than two weeks before the bank’s license was revoked. All defendants received four years each in a general regime colony.
According to “Kommersant”, the organizer of this crime law enforcement agencies believe the ex-beneficiary of NKB Dmitry Rubinov, who for at least two years appeared in the case as an unidentified person. When the police had evidence of his involvement in the withdrawal of funds from NKB, Rubinov, former deputy head of the banking regulation and supervision department of the Central Bank, was already abroad. In 2021, the case against him was separated into a separate proceeding, and on July 20, 2023, the preliminary investigation was suspended due to the search for the defendant.
As Kommersant has already reported, Dmitry Rubinov moved to Israel, of which he is also a citizen, in 2019, after the Ministry of Internal Affairs began investigating fraud in other credit institutions, where he was the ultimate beneficiary and from which tens of billions of rubles disappeared. Thus, in addition to NKB, the former top manager of the Central Bank is considered the ultimate owner of the deprived of license bank “Strategy”, PIR-bank, Tempbank, Inkarobank, UM-bank, Central Insurance Company, as well as the bank “Taatta”. Moreover, the investigation of financial fraud in the latter, as Kommersant reported, turned out for Dmitry Rubinov in absentia charges on October 20, 2021 also in the organization of kidnapping and extortion committed by an organized group (paragraph “a” part 3 of Article 126 and paragraphs “a”, “b” part 3 of Article 163 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). On January 30, 2023, Dmitry Rubinov was also arrested in absentia by the Khamovnichesky Court of Moscow as part of this case.