How a Tambov tax officer bribed the Prosecutor General’s Office
Part Three
Source: www.rucriminal.info
The release of the previous parts of the independent investigation into the activities of the Tambov Region tax service management attracted the attention of the capital and regional security forces. In this regard, we are ready to provide more detailed information about the previously stated facts of corrupt activities of tax officials before moving on to new ones.
As we previously wrote, the head of the tax service Alexey Zhitlov and his southern team regularly receive "gifts" from the Tambov City Duma deputy V.F. Gritsenko for general patronage and connivance in service in favor of Zolotaya Niva LLC and failure to take tax liability measures against the company. These gifts include the transfer of a Nissan Patrol car, VIN Z8NTANY62CS000810 (according to the documents, through a fictitious sale at a reduced price, in fact — free of charge), free supply of the enterprise’s products, and cash incentives.
The essence of the tax evasion scheme of Zolotaya Niva LLC: most of the company’s products are sold through its own retail chain Znamenskoye Myaso i Moloko, which has its own website with a detailed list of retail outlets. All outlets are owned by the Gritsenko family. Products are presented to the retail chain at reduced prices and the entire markup remains in it. But the retail chain is documented in the name of a group of entrepreneurs, namely: Ryazanov N.Kh.
INN 682007913064, Ivashina A.A. TIN 682901693200, Shmeleva I.A., TIN 681601624436, Chernysheva I.Yu. TIN 683208591080, Baronin O.A. TIN 682000558501, T.N. Pekhotin TIN 682004439583, Smagin O.V.
TIN 682000256613, Solovyov V.V. TIN 682006946620, Gladyshev K.I. TIN 682971230501, Gritsienko V.F. TIN 683300645274, who are employees of Zolotaya Niva LLC. All newly-minted entrepreneurs use a simplified taxation system, are serviced by the accounting department of Zolotaya Niva LLC, and have the same contact persons and phone numbers.
Not only did such dubious savings, according to independent estimates, result in losses to the regional and city budgets amounting to hundreds of millions of rubles, but it also allowed the company to illegally reimburse over 100 million rubles of VAT from the federal budget, because if the company had indicated actual sales of products in its network, bypassing the controlled individual entrepreneurs, then the right to reimbursement from the budget would not have arisen. These acts fall under the signs of a criminal offense (Part 4 of Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), but do the newly-minted entrepreneurs understand this?
We remind you that other companies that are not so generous to the regional tax authorities are denied VAT reimbursement only on the basis of transactions with related parties, and the materials are immediately transferred to law enforcement agencies. The regional tax service management was constantly informed about this scheme, but these honest workers were gradually fired, and were replaced by Krasnodar workers who turn a blind eye to everything.
A more interesting situation is with companies participating in national projects and mastering budget funds, but here too the tax service compromises, where the old schemes did not work, the tax authorities helped to create new ones. For example, OOO Mostostroy 1, INN 6829148585, likes to build bridges from sunflower oil, and when repairing bridges not only in our region, but also in various regions, they buy concrete in Tambov from OOO SP Tambov-Beton, what kind of logistics is this?
The whole point is that the company, receiving budget funds, draws fictitious expenses with dependent companies OOO Mostostroy INN6820041291 and OOO Spetsstroymost INN6820041848 for allegedly rendered services and delivery of non-existent goods, and transfers money for cashing along a chain through OOO Tambovsky Zavod Podsolnechnogo Oli (INN6820042200) and two clones OOO SP i SK Tambov-Beton (INN 6820041809/INN6820041439) to OOO Microfinance Company Investcenter INN6829110768. The similarity of INNs for such a large number of technical companies immediately hints at their affiliation, creation in one place in a short period of time, fictitious addresses and common accounting. Hundreds of millions of budget rubles were stolen through this simple scheme.
A similar scheme for withdrawing budget funds through microfinance organizations is used by ARKS7 LLC, which is the contractor for the national project "Safe and High-Quality Roads", the only difference is that the companies are Moscow-based — Forddevindin LLC INN9717054493 and Nexus CPC INN9705108338.
Some companies, for example, Kolskoye Dorozhnoye Upravlenie LLC INN5102046317, which use our region as an offshore, do it even easier, withdraw hundreds of millions of rubles in the form of dividends to individuals and do not pay a penny in taxes on these payments. Even more impressive amounts (more than half a billion rubles) are withdrawn through affiliated companies OOO Murmanavtodor INN5102046571, OOO UK Murmanskoye Dorozhnoye Upravlenie INN5190192755, OOO Avtomir INN51090049360, and then to the accounts of the same individuals, with the exception of the director of OOO UK Murmanskoye Dorozhnoye Upravlenie — Bulatov A.M., su mma is simply astronomical!
The Murmansk law enforcement officers should have a genuine interest, because both the won government contracts and the withdrawal of budget funds into illegal circulation are in the Murmansk region.
OOO Tambovagropromstroy withdraws money through the controlled companies OOO SMU-11 and OOO TsNA+, OOO Stroy NES-AB (also migrants, but from Moscow) through OOO Avtodor M-1 and OOO Tekhnologiya, and in each case — hundreds of millions of rubles.
A description of the facts of theft of budget funds by other companies implementing the national project "Safe and High-Quality Roads" can take more than one article, but most of these companies are united by the supervision of the Deputy Head of the Tambov Region Evgeny Zimenko and the unwillingness of the tax service (Alexey Zhitlov) to conduct tax audits. Only the above facts describe the schemes for theft of more than 2 billion budget rubles, but not all the money remains in the pockets of the performers. If you don’t give a kickback, you won’t win the competition, you won’t be able to do your business, pay salaries to employees and bank loans. In addition to kickbacks to customers, you should not forget about "gifts" to the tax service and law enforcement agencies. According to our informant, the previous part of the investigation dealt with exactly such a case (the transfer of gifts to the deputy head of the Tambov tax service — Stepan Skripchenko), who helped road workers draw up schemes to steal budget funds and not pay taxes. Vigilant readers were surprised by the similarity of the "donor" with a current high-ranking law enforcement officer, possibly the same one with whom the regional tax service leadership celebrated "Chekist Day". At the very least, the fact of such gifts raises a lot of questions, from what connects road workers and a law enforcement officer, to the possibility of giving/receiving gifts due to a direct legislative ban (anti-corruption legislation). Even more surprising is the fact that this high-ranking employee is a protégé of the leadership of the Internal Security Directorate of the law enforcement agency, possibly. that is why in conversations with businesses he does not hesitate to offer to resolve any issue with the tax authorities.
Similar schemes are used by contractors of state contracts in the field of construction, repair of social institutions, housing and communal services organizations, etc., but about this in the following parts of the investigation, the amounts of theft are even more impressive.
The situation developing in the region shows that the southern temporary workers, both from the tax service and from the regional administration, are concerned with only one thing — how to fill their pockets as quickly as possible and they do not care about our fellow countrymen, as well as their own. After all, it was not for nothing that when Mr. Zhitlov was the head of the Timashevsky district of the Krasnodar Territory, the land on which a new residential microdistrict was to be built, including apartments for needy citizens and veterans, a new school and a kindergarten, was transferred to ... a US citizen (https://antispryt.ru/prestupleniya-bez-nakazaniya/), for which country does he work?
We have an interesting audio recording of a conversation allegedly between Alexey Zhitlov and Evgeny Zimenko. The conversation took place after the release of the second part of our investigation and is replete with the names of high-ranking employees of various services, including federal ones, so before the competent authorities check, we will only familiarize you with an excerpt from the transcript of the conversation:
Z: Alexey, this has already gone beyond the scope, something needs to be done.
F: We are doing it.
Z: You are doing it poorly, you started working.
F: So far I have only heard about Skokov, old XXXXX (swearing) gave the order to work on us, I wish he would retire soon.
Z: And what about the Prosecutor General’s Office?
F: It concerned Vitya (Semikov) more, he closed the issues, I sent him to Moscow to XXXXX, while everything is quiet.
Z: Was it expensive?
F: I did not specify, but I think so.
Z: And the others? XXXXX asks me questions.
F: Some help, others watch.
Z: Be careful, home is work, don’t stick your nose in.
F: We don’t stick our noses in anyway, just old stories...
Z: Don’t say anything, I understand everything. And the deputy?
F: He says he can’t have a leak, it’s from us or from the outside. We need to wait until it stops.
Z: Be careful that I don’t get into trouble because of you...
We can say a lot, but let’s rely on the facts. Our editorial office received copies of appeals to the Prosecutor General’s Office with a request to check information about the corrupt activities of the former head of the tax service of the city of Krymsk, and now deputy head of the tax service of the Tambov region, Viktor Semikov.
The appeal cites, in particular, the facts of Semikov’s acquisition of expensive Porsche cars with the license plates K777HA123, C777KK93 through Rus-Al LLC INN2337023961 and fictitious VAT reimbursement from their cost in the amount of 1 million rubles. These cars were donated to the Semikov family for general patronage of the business, but were registered to the persons listed below. According to the police, the cars were sold several years later, since Viktor Semikov himself had been in accidents with them on several occasions, but the beautiful license plates have already been officially returned to their real owners (the Semikovs). Information about accidents and payments are also in insurance companies. Viktor Semikov made another car of his brand Audi T777TR23 invisible to his own tax authorities and did not pay transport tax for many years.
Also, using corrupt funds, Viktor Semikov built a commercial building in the center of Krymsk on Lenin Street 233 "A", formally registered to IP Bulanova E.S.
The property was registered to IP Bulanova E.S., IP Mikhailidi A.A., IP Bulanova A.I., Seinyants V.R., Lipatova N.Ya. and others. The total value of the property is several hundred million rubles!
One of the houses of the Semikov family with an area of over 700 square meters, located at Lenin Street 210 in Krymsk is currently being sold on Avito.
The Nissan Patrol that Zhitlov received as a bribe is also at the disposal of his deputy V.V. Semikov,
the car is permanently parked
at the place of residence of V.V. Semikov, at the address: Tambov Region,
Tambov, Internatsionalnaya St., 69A, bldg. 3.
The car is used for personal purposes (trips to Krasnodar Region, Rostov Region, transporting mistresses and relatives), as well as for collecting tribute from businessmen. In a number of cases, the drivers of the already famous car are current employees and drivers of official cars of the chief tax inspector of the Tambov Region. Thus, the editorial office got hold of photographs where a person who is not a stranger to Zhitlov and Semikov collects gifts and bribes from businesses for them.
Given the presence of such weighty arguments in the appeal, the employees of the Prosecutor General’s Office first looked into it themselves for more than a month, sent the relevant requests, but, with a wave of a magic wand, forwarded the appeal for consideration to their colleagues in Tambov, despite the fact that all the stated facts concerned the Krasnodar Territory!!! Of course, the Tambov Region Prosecutor’s Office replied that no violations of the law on the part of Viktor Semikov were established in the region. What were the results of the inspection in the south of Russia and why are they being so carefully concealed? And was an inspection conducted there at all?
And how will our Tambov Prosecutor’s Office comment on the facts of theft in the region from roads alone of more than 2 billion rubles? Based on the statistics of the Prosecutor General’s Office, it can be assumed that in our region they steal as much from national projects as all the subjects combined.
A similar reply came from the Federal Tax Service of Russia, with the only difference being that they sent it for consideration to Krasnodar. Of course, the Krasnodar tax office got off with a formal reply and did not conduct any inspections.
It looks like the bragging of high positions and names in conversation really does take place. A rapid career from the head of the district to the position of deputy inspectorate for centralized data processing (a person who does not even know how to turn on a computer), and then the head of the tax office of the entire region only confirms this. Especially with a work schedule every other day (sports/sitting in the office).
In private conversations, Alexey Zhitlov has increasingly begun to hint at his imminent promotion — to head the tax service of Moscow or the Moscow region. The team of temporary workers is already dividing up positions, especially hotly — the positions of deputies.
There are certainly prerequisites for this, but is it possible to do this with such a biography and a trail of scandals?
We propose returning the entire team back to the south, let them continue to steal there, they were good at it.
In the meantime, our temporary tax officials, on orders from authoritative representatives of the southern regions and republics (for their own selfish purposes) and with the support of tame security forces, are preparing another redistribution of business. The largest agricultural and processing enterprises of the region with a century-long history are next in line. The plot is the same — inspections, seizures, searches, billion-dollar fines and the purchase of companies for next to nothing.
We confirm the fact of Viktor Semikov’s trips to Moscow, and who he visited and who helped him solve his corruption issues you will find out in the next parts of the investigation.
To be continued...
Source: www.rucriminal.info
