On 17 August 2026, the Prioksky District Court of Nizhny Novgorod granted the lawsuit filed by the Nizhny Novgorod Interdistrict Environmental Protection Prosecutor's Office to recover from the former head of the Rosprirodnadzor department for the Volga Federal District Oleg Kruchinin more than 11 million rubles received in the form of bribes.[1] According to the investigation, the amount of illicit income totaled more than 11.5 million rubles.[2]

Circumstances of the case

According to the materials of the criminal case, between 2017 and 2021 Kruchinin systematically received monetary payments from legal entities engaged in waste removal, as well as from the heads of organizations under his oversight, in exchange for general patronage and dereliction of official duty.[2][3] In 2024, the court found him guilty under Part 6, Article 290 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (taking a bribe on an especially large scale) and sentenced him to 13 years in a strict-regime penal colony, along with a fine of 230 million rubles. Kruchinin did not admit guilt and was unable to appeal the verdict.[1]

Civil claims and property

The environmental prosecutor petitioned the court to have the illegally obtained funds converted to state revenue; the court granted the claim in full.[1][2] At the same time, the prosecutor's office sought the confiscation of property linked to the convicted man and registered to him, his wife, and his mother: five cars (two Mercedes-Benz vehicles, a Chevrolet Camaro, a Cadillac Escalade, and a LADA), two apartments in Nizhny Novgorod, a plot of land, a residential house, and a 1/7 share in another plot. The court found that the defendants had no lawful income sufficient to acquire this property and granted the agency's claims.[2] In addition, the Federal Property Management Agency (Rosimushchestvo) office for Nizhny Novgorod Oblast filed a lawsuit to evict the convicted man's former wife, Veronika Kruchinina, and their three children from an Sergievskaya Street in the center of Nizhny Novgorod.[1]

Sources

  1. NIA "Nizhny Novgorod" — The court recovered more than 11 million rubles in bribes from Oleg Kruchinin (archive)
  2. Newsroom24 — The court recovered 11 million rubles in bribes from former Nizhny Novgorod official Oleg Kruchinin (archive)
  3. Otkrytiy Nizhny — More than 11 million rubles recovered from former head of Rosprirodnadzor department (archive)