The Ministry of Internal Affairs is getting involved with the debts of Energotream

The energy companies, which suffered fr om the failures to pay of the energy selling companies – members of Energostream holding, demand criminal prosecution of its co-founders, the Shandalov brothers Valery and Andrey, who are deemed owners of Optima Group. The debts of the Energostream members have piled up to 50 billion roubles, only some 15 of which have been yet paid off. As lawyers note, the property of the parties to the criminal scheme may be charged in the course of consideration of the criminal cases. However, such charge of property of yet another co-founder of Energostream Yury Zhelyabovsky, who has been wanted since 2012, has hardly given the creditors anything.
The powermen initiated the campaign of bringing the two co-founders of the Energostream energy selling holding, the Shandalov brothers Valery and Andrey, to liability. Large general companies have recently sent letters to the Minister of Internal Affairs Vladimir Kolokoltsev requesting to check those persons and circumstances for the event of the crime and the corpus delicti.
Energostream, which used to be owned by the Shandalovs and the General Director of the holding Yury Zhelyabovsky, consolidated the controlling shares of regional energy sellers after the dissolution of the UES of Russia RJSC. They accumulated over 50 billion roubles of the debt to the energy market over the course of the years 2011 – 2013, 23,5 billion of those – to the power producers. It is believed that the holding’s problems began in 2011, when Yury Zhelyabovsky was criticized by Vladimir Putin (the then Chairman of the Government of Russia). A sharp conflict between the co-owners of Energostream ensued, which caused the partitioning of the assets.
The regulators began their crusade against debtors in 2013, and the holding’s sellers lost the status of guaranteeing energy supplier (the loss of the status causes the end of the business). The areas of responsibility of those companies were sold to other energy sellers at tenders, and approximately 30% of the debts (some 15 billion roubles) were repaid from those proceeds. But a large part of that was paid by the energy companies – creditors of Energostream themselves. Bankruptcy proceedings are in course concerning the remaining amounts, but the NCO “Energy Generators Council” (EGC, unites large generators) believes that “the chances of debt repayment in that way appear minimal”.
The Shandalovs were listed as founders of Stroyexpert LLC, which borrowed 11,9 billion roubles from Energostream companies and which is currently bankrupt, as well as other companies, wh ere the funds were being transferred. Unlike Y.Zhelyabovsky, who became wanted federally in November of 2012 and internationally – in December of 2012, they are not wanted. The Investigation Department of the MIA has charged Y.Zhelyabovsky with crimes under Article 210, part 4, Article 159 and Article 172 of the Penal Code (organization of a criminal group, grievous fraud, laundering of property or money obtained by criminal means). All charges were made in absentia, because he is hiding abroad. In autumn, the cases against Yury Zhelyabovsky and his supposed accomplices (some of whom are in custody, and others wanted like him) were merged under Article 210 of the Penal Code.
As EGC members explain, there are criminal counter-cases within the framework of the corporate proceedings between the Shandalovs and Yury Zhelyabovsky, but the market participants gain nothing from that. The generator companies filed in 2013 18 claims to initiate criminal proceedings in the locations of the seller companies, but EGC says that nine of those were dismissed for the reason of no corpus delicti, and simply no information was given in the other nine instances.
Alexander Petrov, Advocate of the Law Firm "YUST", says that if it will be ascertained in the course of the penal proceedings that certain individuals were involved with the criminal scheme, civil claims may be moved against them afterwards to compensate for damages, and to charge their property if successful. Y.Zhelyabovsky’s property is already contested: in August, the Moscow City Court sequestered the house and the land plot owned by his wife. Andrey Shandalov and Valery Shandalov are reputed to be owners of Optima Group, which does engineering, supplies equipment, constructs power objects and renders various services. According to the RAS, the company’s proceeds in 2013 reached 373 million roubles, and 1,3 million of net profits.