Another 2 billion rubles are being demanded from Oleg Sorokin; the court has begun examining the case.

      13 November 2025 11:15 Incidents The court in Semyonov, Nizhny Novgorod Region, has begun considering a prosecutor’s suit to recover more than 2 billion rubles from former head of Nizhny Novgorod Oleg Sorokin and his ex-wife Elada Nagornaya. The supervisory authority believes that the dividends paid to Nagornaya by the company "Start-Stroy" from 2016 to 2022 are corrupt income and should be seized in favor of the state. This was reported by "Kommersant-Privolzhye."

      According to the prosecution, Sorokin, who led the city from 2010 to 2015, used his official position to shield "Start-Stroy," in which his (now former) wife owned a 60% stake. The organization, investigators say, was involved in laundering funds of dubious origin under the guise of net profit.

      The company "Start-Stroy," whose dividends are the subject of the suit, is not officially participating in the case so far. A source close to the developer said the firm had no means to vet its founders for corruption and relied on banks’ checks when obtaining loans. According to him, none of the major creditors had claims against the company.

      At the preliminary hearing, Nagornaya’s representative said his client completely disagrees with the prosecutor’s demands and submitted a reasoned objection, to which she has not yet received a response. He also petitioned for a closed hearing, citing that documents containing "commercial and banking secrecy, as well as personal information," will be examined in the process. The prosecution did not object, and the judge took a pause to make a decision.

      Sorokin’s representative did not appear in court but stated an intention to participate further. If the proceedings are closed, the ex-mayor will not be able to appear by video link from the penal colony as he did previously, because such a form of participation is not provided for in a closed trial.

      It should be noted that this is not the first large suit against Sorokin and Nagornaya. Earlier the Prosecutor General’s Office obtained recovery of 1.5 billion rubles of profit from the company "Ingradstroy," linked to Sorokin, and the prosecutor’s office of the Nizhny Novgorod district recovered another 1 billion rubles, valuing Nagornaya’s stake in "Start-Stroy" at that amount.

      In addition, Oleg Sorokin is serving a ten-year term in a maximum-security penal colony for receiving a bribe on a particularly large scale, as well as for complicity in a kidnapping.

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