RosPil won yesterday in the "ninth court." A very useful result in terms of the systemic fight against fraud in the sale of state property. Crooks from Rosimushchestvo (Russia’s Federal Agency for State Property Management) sold five heritage buildings in Yekaterinburg. All of them went for prices far below market value. To pull off this scheme, they illegally barred all potential buyers from the auction—buyers who were ready to pay more. The day after the auction, the "winner" put the buildings up for resale. A wonderful way for state crooks to make money. The building we were in court over yesterday was sold for 6.9 million rubles, while its market value is over 22 million rubles. The buyers who were thrown out of the auction complained to RosPil, and then we went to court on their behalf (RosPil itself could not do this; protecting the public interest is supposed to be the prosecutor’s office’s job, but it is busy covering up illegal casinos, so it has no time for this). The first hearing did not go well, and the Moscow Arbitration Court ruled against us on some completely idiotic grounds:
Basically, they said the public procurement law had not been violated. Well, obviously it hadn’t—because it has nothing to do with this case. Full text of the ruling. We filed an appeal (text of the appeal)), and justice prevailed: The Moscow Arbitration Court’s ruling was overturned. The auction was declared invalid. The contract for the sale of federal property was declared invalid. The consequences of invalidating the transaction were applied—both sides must return everything received under it (restitution). This is huge, and we’re extremely pleased. Courts very rarely order restitution, especially when state bodies and federal property are involved. We’ll post the text of the ruling when we have it in hand. RosPil has won back one of the five buildings and, relying on this ruling, is fully determined to win back the other four. Everyone will be punished. The case for RosPil was handled by Lyubov Sobol—give her credit. She, by the way, is running for the Coordination Council (an opposition body). To vote, you must register first. If you haven’t registered, then you’re Putin (or just an irresponsible citizen).