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Russia sentences Kopaygorodskiy to 15 years in prison for corruption
Former Sochi Mayor Aleksey Kopaygorodskiy was sentenced to 15 years in a high-security prison in his corruption trial in Moscow on October 5, 2026. Kopaygorodskiy and his wife will each pay a 500 million-ruble fine, and the former mayor was barred from holding positions in public administration.
The Meshchansky District Court in Moscow handed down its verdict against former Sochi Mayor Aleksey Kopaygorodskiy on October 5, 2026. Kopaygorodskiy was sentenced to 15 years in a high-security prison for accepting large bribes, embezzling municipal property and laundering criminal proceeds.
The 41-year-old former mayor was also barred from holding positions in public administration for 14.5 years. This period includes an additional three-year ban that will apply after he completes his prison sentence.
A case stretching from Sochi to Moscow
Kopaygorodskiy served as Sochi mayor from September 2019 to May 2024. He left office in May 2024, saying he would take up a federal position, but the move did not take place.
Kopaygorodskiy later joined a volunteer army battalion fighting in Ukraine and was detained in September 2024 in the Luhansk region, which is under Russian occupation. He was subsequently transferred to Moscow.
Prosecutors had sought a 21-year prison sentence for Kopaygorodskiy and a 16-year sentence for his wife, Yanina Kopaygorodskaya. The court sentenced Yanina Kopaygorodskaya to 10 years in prison for acting as an accomplice.
Fines and seized assets
Kopaygorodskiy and his wife will each pay a 500 million-ruble fine. The former mayor's state medal was revoked. Kopaygorodskiy's aide, Aleksandr Pasunko, was also fined 190,000 rubles.
In January, a court in Sochi ordered the seizure of the family's assets, whose total value exceeded 1.6 billion rubles.
Prosecutors' bribery and witness allegations
Prosecutors alleged that Kopaygorodskiy received more than 319 million rubles in bribes from businesspeople and contractors between 2022 and 2024 in exchange for facilitating matters and providing protection. Prosecutors also alleged that Kopaygorodskiy embezzled two municipal plots of land and concealed the origin of those assets.
Yanina Kopaygorodskaya was accused of forcing a witness to give false testimony while under house arrest and of offering another witness a 500,000-ruble bribe through Pasunko. Kopaygorodskiy and his wife denied the charges against them.
Kopaygorodskiy became one of at least 10 current and former deputy governors who have faced criminal investigations since Veniamin Kondratyev became governor of Krasnodar Krai in 2015.
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