MOSCOW. May 15 (Interfax) - The state prosecutor is seeking 15.5 years in a penal colony and a fine in an amount of 494 million rubles for Col. Dmitry Zakharchenko, a former officer of the Russian Interior Ministry's Anti-Corruption Directorate, in the case involving bribery and obstruction of justice, an Interfax correspondent has reported.
"I am asking the court to sentence Zakharchenko to 15 years and six months in a high-security penal colony and give him a fine in an amount of 494.94 million rubles," prosecutor Milana Digayeva said at the presentation of arguments at the trial of the Zakharchenko case in the Moscow Presnensky District Court on Wednesday.
Zakharchenko, the former acting head of the T Division of the Russian Interior Ministry's Anti-Corruption Department, is charged with bribery and obstruction of justice. He has been in custody since September 10, 2016.
In accordance with the indictment, Zakharchenko and his presumed accomplice, former Federal Security Service officer Dmitry Senin, received $800,000 from Medi Duss, a beneficiary of the chain of fish restaurants La Maree, in 2014.
The prosecutors say Zakharchenko organized inspections of the businessman's enterprises, some of which involves officials from the Russian Interior Ministry's Anti-Corruption Department , for the purpose of pressure and extortion of a bribe. According to the indictment, the colonel and Senin initially demanded $5 billion from Duss.
The investigators found that, after the money was given, Zakharchenko received from Duss a 50% discount card of the La Maree restaurant chain "for actions or lack thereof, using the authority of his post," which he used to save over three million rubles in visits to the restaurants, thus receiving another bribe from the businessman.
In both situations, the mediator between Zakharchenko and Duss was former high-ranking Interior Ministry official Alexei Laushkin, the indictment said.
At the same time, investigators believe that the former police officer has warned Larisa Marchukova, sister of Nota Bank CFO Galina Marchukova, of impending searches.
The colonel pleads not guilty on all the counts and calls all the criminal cases against him fake.
The Moscow Presnensky District Court began trying the Zakharchenko case on August 2, 2018.
Col. Zakharchenko gained prominence after cash in various currencies worth some eight billion rubles was found in the apartment of his half-sister in 2016.