Former Head of Russian Authors' Society Jailed for Fraud

June 20, 2017

Sergei Fedotov Dmitry Serebryakov / TASS

The former head of the Russian Authors' Society (RAO) has been jailed for 18 months after pleading guilty to charges of fraud.

Sergei Fedotov was arrested on suspicion of fraud on June 28, 2016.

Prosecutors told Moscow's Meshchansky Court that Fedotov deliberately misled the RAO board, encouraging them to transfer property to a private company. The company then sold the property to third parties, leaving the RAO out of pocket to the sum of 300 million rubles ($5.1 million).

Fedotov told Russia’s Interfax news agency that he had already repaid some of the damages, and was considering an appeal against his sentence.

"I’ve repaid 160 million rubles out of more than 300 million rubles," he said. “But in order to make these payments, I need to work: something I haven’t recently been able to do.”

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