A Russian army general charged with fraud has reportedly earned almost $700,000 while in detention from shares that investigators believe were acquired with embezzled money.
Alexander Ogloblin, former department chief at the Armed Forces’ general communications agency, was charged in a half-billion ruble ($7.3 million) embezzlement scheme of state funds earlier this year. Military prosecutors accuse him of receiving kickbacks from a friend’s contracting firm as part of a program to digitize the military’s secure communication system.
Investigators now believe that Ogloblin had earned 46.5 million rubles ($686,300) through a trustee last year, the Kommersant business daily reported Wednesday.
The major general has denied his guilt and asserts his constitutional right against self-incrimination, according to the daily.
Ogloblin reportedly invested 150 million of the illegally earned rubles in 2015-2016 to buy shares in a communication enterprise that supplies some of Russia’s leading energy companies and telecom providers.
The enterprise received military contracts averaging a reported 1 billion rubles per year between 2014 and 2018.
Kommersant reported that a military court seized Ogloblin’s shares and the 46.5 million rubles in dividends last month.
