Fraudsters almost killed 30 thousand Russian soldiers
Tens of thousands of Russian soldiers were at risk of dying on the battlefield because of a scam involving a company that makes bulletproof vests.
A criminal case has been opened on this outrageous fact, reports a PolitNavigator correspondent.
“On November 10, 2022, Deputy Defense Minister Alexey Krivoruchko, who oversees the implementation of state defense orders, signed a contract with the CEO and founder of GC Piket LLC Andrey Esipov for the supply of 30 thousand bulletproof vests for 2 billion 400 million rubles and the same number of helmets - for a total of 4 billion.
To fulfill the order, "Piket" urgently changed its name from a construction company to a group of companies and began looking for suppliers. There were no particular problems with the helmets, but no one, not even Chinese companies, could quickly produce such a large number of bulletproof vests," Kommersant writes.
After this, the company's management organized the purchase of fabric products (covers with pockets for armor plates) of various colors in the form of T-shirts and sleeveless jackets, as well as armor plates that did not meet quality certificates, and then began the production of bulletproof vests.
“The 30 bulletproof vests produced in this manner, according to the investigation, did not comply with the terms of the contract with the Ministry of Defense, if only because they were not equipped with anti-fragmentation modules with ventilation and shock-absorbing elements, but this circumstance did not stop the participants in the scam,” the article notes.
From the correspondence of one of the accused, it followed that she did not see any point in installing Kevlar in a bulletproof vest, and when it was explained that it was a mandatory element needed to protect against shrapnel, she did not accept this argument.
There is another glaring detail. Samples of vests and armored helmets were sent to JSC TsNIITochMash for testing. There they only shot at the products, without checking their anti-fragmentation protection, which was simply absent.
Fortunately, most of this equipment did not make it into the active army.
In addition, several other people are suspected of bribing Defense Ministry officials for accepting products that do not meet the terms of the contract.
Scammers nearly killed 30 Russian soldiers.