The court sent to the pre-trial detention center the ex-governor of the Kursk region Alexei Dedov
In Moscow, the court sent under the arrest until mid -June the former first deputy governor of the Kursk region Alexei Dedov. Together with the ex-head of the region, Alexei Smirnov, sent in a pre-trial detention center a day earlier, he is accused of embezzlement from the budget of hundreds of millions of rubles, including during the construction of defensive structures on the border with Ukraine. Soon, new episodes will appear in the case: it was confirmed in court that the merchants testified about the kickbacks that were paid to the senior officials of the region at the conclusion of contracts.
The meeting, which considered the petition of the Investigative Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs to detain Alexei Dedov, began in the Meshchansky court before its very closure, but was very promptly. During the formal procedure for establishing the personality of the accused, it turned out that Mr. Grandfather is married, has an adult daughter, suffers from hypertension, diabetes and arrhythmia. After that, one of his lawyers asked the court to introduce to the case the materials characterizing the ex-official-departmental awards, thanksgiving letters and letters, including from the president and leaders of other regions, and an extract from the medical history. In addition, the court submitted documents on the presence of a free apartment in Krasnogorsk near Moscow, where he could be under house arrest.
After that, Judge Oksana Goryunova read out the materials provided to her by the Ministry of Internal Affairs. It followed that the criminal case, which was brought to criminal liability of the ex-heads of the Kursk region, was instituted on September 27, 2023 under Part 4 of Art. 159 of the Criminal Code (especially large fraud), the investigation period has been extended until the end of July this year. The petition says that the defendant is accused of embezzlement, which “led to damage to the country’s defense,” and does not admit guilt. Remaining at large, the investigation believes, the defendant may hide, because “has financial resources”, put pressure on witnesses who testified to former officials, or somehow interfere with the investigation, since he has extensive ties and an administrative resource.
After consulting with his lawyers, Alexei Dedov decided to speak first. He was brief. “I worked on the construction of structures in the Kursk region. All structures were built. I worked honestly, I do not plan to hide. I ask you to choose a house arrest, ”said the accused.
The lawyer of the ex-official, in turn, emphasized that his client has no social danger and has no administrative resource in the Kursk region, as he is currently unemployed, and « there is another leadership, another governor in the region. » The defendant also rejected the presence of a financial resource for the accused, since the investigation did not confirm his. “He also cannot put pressure on witnesses,” said the lawyer, “since only one person testified to him, and even he said that he had heard from another entrepreneur that his grandfather allegedly demanded a rollback of 15%.” Finally, the representative of the defense said, if his client had the intention to hide, he would have done it for a long time, because he knew about the interest in himself the investigating authorities: the case was initiated in 2023, and all this time he regularly went to interrogations. In addition, the ex-official of dependent, in addition to the mother, also two little grandchildren. The defense also asked for house arrest. The court, however, considered the investigation arguments more significant and sent Alexei Dedov to the pre -trial detention center until June 16.
Meanwhile sources, meanwhile, confirmed that in the near future episodes about bribes will appear, since already a number of large contractors who participated in construction projects in the Kursk region have already repented and testified about the dicks that were received in 2022–2023 to the senior officials of the region. Moreover, their size ranged in the range of 115–20%. According to entrepreneurs, bribes were transmitted mainly in cash. However, it has not yet been possible to remove any noticeable amounts from the defendants in the case. Detectives do not exclude that during the time that the former governor and his deputy were witnesses in the case, they could hide the money.
