117 cases of fraudulent company registrations were sent to Nizhny Novgorod courts.

      30 November 2025 16:00 Incidents

      From January to September 2025, 138 criminal cases were initiated in the Nizhny Novgorod region related to the illegal creation of legal entities and the registration of individual entrepreneurs. This was reported by Major of Justice Ekaterina Khusnullina — senior investigator for particularly important cases of the control-and-methodological department for economic crimes of the Main Investigative Department (GSU) of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia for the region.

      These are crimes provided for by Article 173.1 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. As of October, 147 such cases were pending. Of them, ten have been completed and already sent to court for substantive consideration.

      In addition, territorial investigative units of the Interior Ministry investigated 156 criminal cases over the year initiated under Article 173.2 of the Criminal Code, which pertains to the illegal use of documents when creating legal entities or registering individual entrepreneurs. According to Khusnullina, 144 of these cases were initiated in 2025, and 117 of them have already been referred to court.

      During a briefing, a representative of the GSU gave a specific example of an investigated case brought under Part 2 of Article 173.1 of the Criminal Code. The materials of this case have already been forwarded to the court by investigators from the investigative unit of the Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for Nizhny Novgorod.

      In December 2023, the accused entered into a preliminary conspiracy with another person whose identity has not yet been established. Together they organized a scheme to create fictitious firms through front persons. Deliberately false information about persons who did not intend to manage the created organizations was sent to the bodies responsible for state registration.

      The criminal group pre-assigned roles. The accused was responsible for preparing all the necessary documents for registering legal entities and entering data into the Unified State Register of Legal Entities (EGRUL). He also accompanied the front persons to a certification center, where qualified certificates for electronic signature keys were issued in their names. The certificates thus obtained were then used to submit registration documents without the participation of the nominal participants themselves.

      The accomplice, according to the investigation, was to find citizens not interested in entrepreneurial activity and offer them monetary compensation in exchange for agreeing to register fictitious firms in their names.

      In December 2023, implementing this plan, the accused and his accomplice found a person who agreed for money to register a legal entity in his name. He handed the perpetrators his passport, after which documents were prepared to register an LLC and enter information about it into the EGRUL.

      Later, the accused arrived at the certification center together with this citizen. An official of the agency, unaware of the criminal intentions, accepted the documents, checked them through the interagency electronic interaction system and issued an electronic signature certificate. This document was given to the accused, who subsequently used it to submit papers to register the legal entity without the participation of the nominal founder.

      Major Khusnullina emphasized that such front organizations are often used for illegal financial operations, including cashing out funds. Such actions inflict significant harm on both the state and the economy as a whole.

      It was previously revealed that an organized crime group from the Nizhny Novgorod region appropriated payments meant for participants of the special military operation by arranging fictitious marriages.

      It was also reported that Nizhny Novgorod investigators have sent 133 anti-corruption cases to court since the beginning of 2025.

      NIA "Nizhny Novgorod" has a Telegram channel. Subscribe to stay informed about major events, exclusive materials and operational information.

      Copyright © 1999—2025 NIA "Nizhny Novgorod". A hyperlink to NIA "Nizhny Novgorod" is required when reprinting. This resource may contain 18+ materials.