Judge of the Moscow City Court Vitaly Belitsky sentenced 70-year-old scientist Valery Golubkin to 12 years in a strict regime colony in the case of treason (Article 275 of the Criminal Code). This is reported by the correspondent of «Mediazona» from the courtroom.
Valery Golubkin in the Moscow City Court. Photo: Alexandra Astakhova/Mediazona
The term of punishment will be counted as the period that Golubkin spent in the pre-trial detention center from the moment of his arrest — from April 12, 2021. One day in a pre-trial detention center will be counted as one day in a colony.
The judge also listed the physical evidence that was included in the case. These are, in particular, models of hypersonic vehicles and the visiting card of Golubkin's co-author of scientific works, the Dutch scientist Johann Stillant. This evidence will be kept in the file until a verdict is passed against Golubkin's boss, Anatoly Gubanov, who is also accused of treason.
During the debate, the prosecution requested that the defendant be sentenced to 12 years in prison. The state prosecution was represented by Boris Loktionov and Gulchehra Ibragimova.
A criminal case was opened against the scientist because of his participation in the international project to create a hypersonic passenger aircraft HEXAFLY-INT.
According to investigators, Golubkin handed over reports to colleagues from the Netherlands, which contained state secrets. At the same time, as the First Department emphasizes, all documents were checked three times by specialists before being sent — they did not find state secrets in the reports.
The scientist was detained in April 2021 and sent to the Lefortovo pre-trial detention center. Earlier, in December 2020, Anatoly Gubanov, the head of Golubkin at the Central Aerohydrodynamic Institute (TsAGI), was also arrested in a treason case.
In 2018 and 2019, scientists together published several articles about the HEXAFLY-INT project in the TsAGI journal . The co-author of one article, in addition to other employees of the Institute, was an employee of the European Space Agency.
Earlier, Judge Belitsky sentenced Vitaly Koltsov — he received 6 years in a penal colony for setting fire to paddy wagons in Moscow.