Well-known lawyer Alexander Karabanov has been arrested in Moscow on suspicion of large-scale fraud. A source for the Cheka-OGPU and Rucriminal.info believes the arrest may be related to a complaint filed earlier this year by Karabanov's former client, Yuri Beloyvan, the former owner of the Korchma Taras Bulba restaurant chain (who is currently wanted). In it, he claimed that two buildings in Moscow were stolen from him with the help of his lawyers. It's worth noting that Karabanov, on the side of Solnechny Produkt, actively participated in the "war" with Rusagro and its owner Vadim Moshkovich, which ended with Moshkovich's imprisonment. Moshkovich's entourage says he allocated $25 million to resolve his problems before going to prison.
According to our project's source, when Yuri Beloyvan was charged with tax evasion, law enforcement officials recommended lawyer Alexander Karabanov to him. Karabanov promised to resolve all the problems for a large sum, but Beloyvan ultimately received a two-year prison sentence in 2019. Karabanov was later able to get him out of prison for "health reasons," but as soon as he was released, a new case of tax evasion was opened against him. Beloyvan was forced to leave Russia and was later placed on the wanted list. Almost all of Beloyvan's assets were seized under these circumstances. However, there was also an unofficial "squeeze." The source says that in early 2026, Beloyvan filed a complaint alleging that two buildings—one near Olympic Avenue and one on the Garden Ring—had been fraudulently stolen from him. He believed this could have happened with the involvement of his lawyers, whom he had trusted from the start.
Our source believes Karabanov has a long history of similar cases, so there were ample grounds for initiating a criminal case. The question is, why was a lawyer with close ties to the security forces actually sent to pretrial detention? Karabanov is known to have sided with Solnechny Product and its official owner, Vladislav Burov (a friend of State Duma Speaker and Saratov Region boss Vyacheslav Volodin), in the war against Rusagro and Vadim Moshkovich, who had seized Burov's businesses. Moshkovich, with his vast financial resources and connections, had emerged as the clear winner in this battle for a while. He heaped subsidiary liability and criminal charges on Burov, and proceeded to seize his assets one after another. Burov was even forced to flee to London. But then the situation changed dramatically.
According to our source, in the fall of 2024, on the personal approval of Ivan Tkachev, then head of the FSB's Directorate K, Burov filed a complaint against Moshkovich, which was immediately followed. Sources close to Moshkovich say the Rusagro owner himself believed that the person behind these lawsuits was not Burov or even Volodin, but Demetra Holding, created by VTB but in reality controlled by the Kovalchuks. Demetra has been sweeping up agro-industrial assets for its own purposes in recent years. Those close to him strongly advised Mashkovich to leave the country. But he replied that he had invested a total of $25 million in "solving the problem," most of which had gone "in the right direction," and that he was safe. However, in March 2025, Moshkovich was arrested, and recently the court nationalized Rusagro. If, suddenly, it turned out that Karabanov was playing some kind of behind-the-scenes game in the “war” with Moshkovich, then this could very well cost him his freedom.
