The Prosecutor General’s Office of Belarus terminates the criminal case against the IT company PandaDoc after damages for $ 30 thousand

The General Prosecutor’s Office of Belarus terminated the criminal proceedings under the article on fraud (part 4 of article 209 of the Criminal Code), which was initiated against the employees of the IT company PandaDoc. The case was closed due to damages, informs Telegram channel of the department.

The persons involved in the PandaDoc case, as reported by the Prosecutor General’s Office, pleaded guilty, testified about the circumstances of the crime, compensated for the damage and paid criminal compensation in the amount of over 77 thousand Belarusian rubles (about 2.3 million Russian rubles or more than $ 30.5 thousand).

According to the supervisory authority, PandaDoc employees Viktor Kuvshinov and Dmitry Rabtsevich “ensured the preparation and submission to the territorial inspectorate of the Ministry of Taxes and Tax Collection of an unreasonable application for the return of the difference between the amount of tax deductions and the total amount of VAT calculated on the sale” of services.

The statement contained false information about the transactions. As a result, more than 38 thousand Belarusian rubles (about 1.1 million Russian rubles, or more than $ 15 thousand) were returned to the PandaDoc account, after which the employees “took possession of them and disposed of them at their own discretion,” the Prosecutor General’s Office claims.

In early September 2020, searches were carried out in the Minsk office of PandaDoc. Four employees of the company were accused of embezzling about 107 thousand Belarusian rubles (more than 3 million Russian rubles), later an article changed for “fraud” (part 4 of article 209 of the Criminal Code). PandaDoc linked the criminal prosecution to a project to help security officials who are ready to “go over to the side of good”, but do not dare to quit due to the risks of facing financial difficulties.

The company said in a statement that “a legal precedent has been created that allows any IT company that has refunded VAT to come to and arrest its employees.” As part of the investigation, PandaDoc’s accounts were also blocked. Because of this, more than 250 employees were left without salaries. PandaDoc founder Nikita Mikado announced the suspension of the project in March.

On October 10, President Alexander Lukashenko met with a group of detained oppositionists in the pre-trial detention center. PandaDoc director Dmitry Rabtsevich was also present at that meeting. The very next day he was released. On October 13, the chief accountant of PandaDoc, Yulia Shardiko, and an employee of the company, Vladislav Mikholap, were released. On August 20, the last of the four detainees was released from the pre-trial detention center – product manager at PandaDoc Viktor Kuvshinov, writes “New Newspaper”.