A Russian court has announced the verdict for former deputy governor of Saint Petersburg Marat Hovhannisyan, sentencing him to 5-and-a-half years in prison and fining him 20,000,000 Russian rubles, ABN reports.
The former deputy governor is charged with committing fraud and receiving a bribe in particularly large amounts during construction of the Gazprom Arena stadium. The judge found Hovhannisyan guilty of receiving a bribe, but ruled out fraud.
The Prosecutor General’s Office had applied to the court to sentence Hovhannisyan to 16 years of imprisonment and fine him 60,000,000 Russian rubles. The defense counsels had petitioned for nearly 5 years. Moreover, Hovhannisyan has been in the temporary place for keeping detainees since 2016.
During the trial, the former deputy governor confessed that he was involved in the embezzlement of more than 50,000,000 Russian rubles and added that he hadn’t committed the crime on his own.
