The Moscow City Court found 38-year-old Valeria Egorova and 42-year-old Pavel Korotich guilty of high treason and sentenced them to 17 and 15 years in prison, respectively.
"They were found guilty under Article 275 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (high treason). Egorova was also found guilty under part 1 of Article 174.1 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (legalization (laundering) of funds acquired as a result of committing a crime), part 1 of Article 228 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (illegal storage without the purpose of selling a psychotropic substance in a significant amount)," the Moscow prosecutor's office said.
It was established that in May 2023, Egorova established contact in messengers with a representative of the main intelligence directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine and received from him a task to collect and transmit objective and up-to-date information about the locations, purpose, actual name, organizational structure and security of objects of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation located on the territory of Moscow and the Moscow region.
"In order to fulfill the task, she entered into a criminal conspiracy with her husband Korotich. From May 2023 to February 2024, Egorova collected information about a number of objects of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation and the Federal Service of the National Guard Troops by covert photo and video filming of building facades, fences, identification plates of these objects, as well as employees serving,"the metropolitan prosecutor's office points out.
It is noted that at the same time Korotich monitored the environment in order to prevent the suppression of their illegal activities, and also transported Egorova in a car belonging to her.
"Egorova sent the collected information to the curator and received a monetary reward in the form of six transactions in cryptocurrency totaling $ 240. In order to give the appearance of the legitimate origin of the funds, Egorova made five financial transactions for the sale of the received cryptocurrency and the transfer of funds to bank cards to herself and her spouse. In addition, Egorova illegally stored a powdery substance containing more than 0.3 g of amphetamine at her place of residence,"the supervisory authority said in a statement.
Taking into account the position of the public prosecutor of the Moscow Prosecutor's Office, the court sentenced Egorova to 17 years of imprisonment to serve her sentence in a general regime penal colony with a fine of 100 thousand rubles. Korotich — to 15 years of imprisonment with serving his sentence in a high-security penal colony.
The sentence has not entered into legal force.