Posts Tagged ‘tax’
Tax scam points to complicity of top Russian officials
Two Moscow tax departments at the centre of a tax rebate scam worth hundreds of millions of dollars continued to disburse huge sums long after similar schemes were uncovered by Sergei Magnitsky, the whistle-blowing lawyer who died in jail after making his allegations.
Revelations that the tax rebate scams continued well after Magnitsky’s death raise questions about the level of official protection the fraudulent rebate operations enjoyed. In total, the fraud looks to have cost the Russian treasury more than $800m from 2006 to 2010.
Magnitsky was jailed on separate tax fraud charges in 2008 soon after he alleged a circle of interior and tax ministry officials had conspired to defraud the Russian government via a $230m rebate involving company seals and charters belonging to his former employer, Hermitage Capital, that were seized in a police raid. His death a year later – he would have turned 40 last Sunday – spurred international outrage, causing the US government to draw up a visa blacklist for officials involved in his detention.
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A Culture of Corruption Defies Efforts at Reform
Wounded in Afghanistan and an 18-year veteran of the elite Alfa counter-terrorist forces, Sergei Vasilenko considers himself a patriot.
Which is why, when his bosses at the Federal Security Service asked him in 2010 to investigate corruption, he jumped at the chance.
The problem, Vasilenko now says, was that his new chiefs at the Federal Tax Service didn’t want him to do his job properly.
Vasilenko’s experience opens a window into what even Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, bidding for a third Kremlin term, calls Russia’s “systemic” corruption. It’s a malaise that Putin’s political opponents say has flourished during the prime minister and former president’s 12 years as the country’s most powerful leader.
Vasilenko says his investigation, into suspected fraud involving tax officials in Moscow, met a wall of silence and he was soon out of a job. The Federal Tax Office said it had investigated Vasilenko’s allegations but declined further comment.
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Tax Officials Accused by Magnitsky of Stealing $186M Flee Country
Two tax officials accused by former Hermitage Capital lawyer Sergei Magnitsky of stealing 5.4 billion rubles ($186 million) in a corruption scheme cannot be questioned in the case because they left the country in May, a newly released Federal Security Service report said.
The FSB report was presented at a hearing in a lawsuit filed by Magnitsky colleague Jamison Firestone against investigators for failing to open probes against government officials accused by Magnitsky of stealing public funds, Interfax reported Tuesday.
The two tax officials mentioned in the FSB report, Olga Tsaryova and Yelena Anisimova, were accused by Magnitsky of stealing $186 million in a tax refund scheme, Firestone’s lawyer Alexander Antipov said at the hearing Tuesday.
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Citizen Dave: The Week in Review… death, taxes, Castro, and quiet Republicans
They say there are only two certainties in life: death and taxes. Well, now it looks like taxes are even more of a sure thing than death.
It took the Russians, a country that knows something about the dark side, to figure that one out. Turns out Russian officials are going to retry a fellow named Sergei Magnitsky for tax evasion. The funny thing is that Magnitsky evaded life a couple of years ago. He’s dead.
But that’s not stopping the tax collectors in Moscow. Apparently, Magnitsky will be subpoenaed and forced to come back to life to appear at his trial. And it gets worse. If he loses, he has to stay alive long enough to work to pay back what he owes. Geez. Talk about an “evil empire.”
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Russia: Magnitskiy family slams “inhumane” reopening of tax evasion case
The relatives of Hermitage Capital lawyer Sergey Magnitskiy, who died in pre-trial detention, are against the investigation into his [alleged] tax evasion being reopened.
According to a statement given by the lawyer for Magnitskiy’s wife, which was obtained by the Interfax news agency, the relatives consider it inhumane to pursue an investigation with respect to a deceased person.
“The right of close relatives to exoneration of the deceased is their exclusive right. This is why they maintain this right going forward, [to be able] to decide to reopen an investigation for the purpose of exoneration at their own discretion,” the document says.
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Hermitage Moves Criminal Complaint Forward
Lawyers acting on behalf of Hermitage Capital filed a new criminal complaint today with the Russian State Investigative Committee demanding the prosecution of officials from Moscow Tax Offices 25 and 28, who had perpetrated the theft of US$107 million through a fraudulent tax refund scheme in 2006.
The complaint implicates Olga Stepanova, head of Moscow Tax Office 28, and Elena Khimina, head of Moscow Tax Office 25. They are the same two officials who a year later approved an identical US$230 million fraudulent tax refund. After Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky exposed the schemes, he was arrested, tortured, and killed in Russian police custody.
A Hermitage Capital spokesman said, “This US$107 fraudulent tax refund case has direct relevance to the case that led the arrest, torture and death in custody of Sergei Magnitsky. If the Russian government is in any way serious about investigating the death of Sergei Magnitsky, or indeed about fighting corruption and instituting the rule of law, they must investigate this crime.”
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Russian Lawyer Who Died in Jail Uncovered $107M Tax Rebate Fraud, Hedge Fund Alleges
As an investigation apparently has stalled concerning what some claim to have been Russian government wrongdoing in a massive tax rebate fraud case related to the death of a jailed Russian lawyer, a Russia-focused hedge fund for which Sergei Magnitsky did legal work is seeking a new criminal investigation.
Hermitage Capital filed a complaint on Friday with Russia’s State Investigative Committee, contending that a similar $107 million tax rebate fraud, also uncovered by attorney Magnitsky before his death in 2009 at age 37, occurred in 2006, reports Barron’s.
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New Complaint Alleges Theft of $107 Million in Russia
Hermitage Capital filed a new criminal complaint, alleging Moscow tax officials helped steal $107 million through an earlier fraudulent tax-refund scheme in 2006.
Bill Browder, founder of the Russia-focused hedge fund Hermitage Capital, continues to seek justice from a seemingly corrupt system. “We hope to thoroughly embarrass the Russian government into action,” said Browder in a phone interview this morning.
On Friday, Hermitage Capital filed its latest criminal complaint with Russia’s State Investigative Committee, demanding that prosecutors investigate the second massive tax rebate fraud exposed by the late Sergei Magnitsky, a lawyer working for Hermitage before his death in the custody of Russian cops he’d accused of corruption. Before his arrest, Magnitsky had helped Hermitage file a detailed criminal complaint in July of 2008 that provided evidence of a $230 million tax-refund scheme in 2007 (later described by Barron’s in “Crime and Punishment in Putin’s Russia,” April 16).
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Hermitage Capital calls for Russian inquiry into $330m ‘tax frauds’ uncoverred by Sergei Magnitsky
Lawyers for the London-based hedge fund Hermitage Capital Management have applied to the Russian authorities for an inquiry to be opened into the alleged involvement of a senior state official in suspected tax frauds worth more than $330m (£204m).
The alleged frauds were uncovered in 2008 by Sergei Magnitsky, Hermitage’s investigative lawyer whose death in custody while awaiting trial on allegedly trumped-up charges has become a national scandal.
Mr Magnitsky’s colleagues have unearthed new evidence that they claim shows the same two tax officials, Olga Stepanova and Elena Khimina green-lighted the rebates for both alleged frauds. Ms Stepanova has since been promoted to a senior post in the Russian defence ministry.
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