A Nizhny Novgorod region court reduced the sentence of a former business partner of jailed Yukos founder Mikhail Khodorkovsky by four months, meaning that he will leave prison in October.
Vladimir Malakhovsky, who previously headed Yukos affiliate Ratibor, was arrested in 2004 and sentenced to 12 years' jail time in 2007 for embezzlement and money laundering.
The Nizhny Novgorod region court's ruling, passed Aug. 3 but only reported Wednesday by Khodorkovsky.ru, is the fifth time that Malakhovsky's sentence has been cut. Malakhovsky will have served seven years and 10 months by Oct. 10, when he is expected to be released.
Last week, an Arkhangelsk region court reduced the sentence of Platon Lebedev, another former business associate of Khodorkovsky, by three years and four months.
Malakhovsky's conviction was part of the Yukos case, in which the Russian government accused the oil company's management of defrauding the state in one of the most high-profile trials in modern Russian history.
As a result of the crackdown, Yukos, once Russia's largest oil company, was bankrupted by back-tax claims, and its were assets bought up by state-run Rosneft for a song.
To this day, Kremlin critics consider the Yukos trial politically motivated.
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