“Employees of the Administration for Economic Security and Combating the Corruption of the Russian MIA General Administration for the Moscow Region together with colleagues from the General Administration for Economic Security and Combating the Corruption of the Russian MIA curbed activities of an organized group whose members are suspected of illegal banking carried out in Russia,” said Russian MIA official representative Irina Volk.

As was established, the malefactors having no special permit (license) had been performing illegal bank transactions, including cash collection, cash services to individuals and legal entities, cash-out, money transfers without opening bank accounts, and had thus obtained income in an especially large amount.

For those purposes, the offenders had used accounts of over 200 entities under their control. The monthly shadow money turnover had approximated 1 billion rubles.

The General Investigation Administration of the Russian MIA General Administration initiated criminal cases against five members of the organized group based on essential elements of a crime stipulated by Article 172 “Illegal banking”, Article 159 “Fraud”, and Article 210 “Organization of a criminal community and involvement in it” of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.

The Moscow Region police together with servicemen of Special Rapid Response Unit “Bulat” and the Special Purpose Police Unit carried out 65 searches (including in 3 credit institutions, 10 offices, and 52 places of residence) simultaneously in five constituent entities of the Russian Federation (Moscow, the Moscow Region, Saint Petersburg, the Republic of Dagestan, and the Krasnoyarsk Territory).

As a result of the measures taken, the police confiscated more than 60 million rubles meant to be dispensed to clients, 25 credit cards issued in assumed names through which the offenders had been cashing out money, over 500 seals of the entities under their control, electronic media, and keys to the Bank-Client system for remote management of settlement accounts.

Twenty members of the organized group were detained on suspicion of the above crimes according to Article 91 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation; 17 of them were remanded in custody, and the 3 others were put under house arrest.

The police are carrying out further investigation and search operations aiming to identify and detain all persons involved in that illicit activity.

Download the official comment given by Russian MIA official representative Irina Volk

Download the video about the operations