Yesterday they started showing a multi-part feature film about the tragic fate of the director of the famous Moscow grocery store No. 1, Yuri Sokolov. During the years of Brezhnev's stagnation, when it was lucky to meet smoked sausage in a store, in Eliseevsky (as the store was called before the revolution and so it continued to be called unofficially in the Soviet years) on Gorky Street, the shelves were bursting with the freshest products. And in 1984, he was shot by a court verdict on charges of corruption ... Sergei Makovetsky starred in the role of Yuri Sokolov (in the film, his character's name is Georgy Berkutov).
There are many eyewitnesses of those events: after all, everything happened only 25 - 27 years ago. One of them was Iosif Kobzon, who personally knew Sokolov. The singer shared his memories with KP.
Iosif Davydovich, you met with the director of Eliseevsky, didn't you?
I not only met, but knew Yuri Konstantinovich closely. And it's not about the products that were sold in Eliseevsky. It was a pleasure to communicate with him. He arranged evenings of rest for the team, and many artists came to him without any fee. The only thing we counted on was the purchase of a shortage, which was packed into the base of the store.
Were you friends?
Communicated during non-working hours. He was a war veteran, a member of the bureau of the district committee of the party. Intelligent. There were always flowers on his table... The staff was always in starched dressing gowns, polite - in those days it was a rarity. He had a wonderful family: wife Florida, daughter ... They came to visit me, I came to them. No one could have imagined how everything would turn out.
Now they say that he became a victim of Andropov's intrigues.
At the trial, in his last word, Sokolov pleaded not guilty. He simply said that he worked in the system and tried to do everything so that people could come and buy products. He was ahead of his time, was a wonderful organizer. Something was not divided upstairs and Sokolov's card was played. He became a victim, although there were almost no such business executives in the country.
The feeling that then for the sake of sausage people went to any lengths.
Well, of course, not at all, as you say. But blat existed, he was beautifully sung in his miniatures by Arkady Raikin. For example, after a concert in Ulyanovsk, Boris Brunov and I (head of the Variety Theatre. - Ed.) came to the grocery store and asked the director for 400 grams of sausage and two bottles of milk. Because this deficit was issued on coupons. And we didn't have them.
BY THE WAY
What is the movie about?
The tape is based on real events. The director of grocery store No. 1 is known and loved by all of Moscow, artists, officials, astronauts strive to be friends with him. The secret of abundance was simple: the director begged for the best from suppliers, seeking favors with envelopes of money. But he had money: he reduced the loss of products during storage to almost zero, he still wrote off “rot” on paper, and he put the goods on sale. After his arrest, everyone was sure that he would get off with a minimum term. But then Yuri Andropov put pressure on the first secretary of the Moscow City Party Committee Viktor Grishin, whose man was considered the director of the grocery store. He became a victim of party squabbles ... In addition to Makovetsky, other famous actors starred in the film - Maria Shukshina, Mikhail Porechenkov, Yulia Peresild, Evgenia Simonova. Directed by Sergei Ashkenazy.
HELP "KP"
Yuri Konstantinovich SOKOLOV was born in 1923. Member of the Great Patriotic War, was awarded orders and medals. He worked as a taxi driver, started in trade as a salesman. He was the director of grocery store No. 1 for 10 years. Arrested in 1982 on charges of accepting a bribe. In 1983, by decision of the Supreme Court of the USSR, he was sentenced for embezzlement to death with confiscation of property and deprivation of all awards. At the trial, he tried to talk about the schemes of embezzlement, to name the names of the officials who took part in this, but he was not allowed to finish. Four more defendants in the case received various terms. On December 14, 1984, shortly before the start of perestroika, Sokolov's sentence was carried out.
"Deli Case No. 1". Monday - Thursday evening. First
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Iosif Kobzon: We bought sausage and milk by pull. Artem BELOUSOV
The last years before Perestroika were remembered by Soviet citizens as a time of total deficit. All the stores in the USSR could show only empty shelves, at best decorated with stacks of canned food. For any food and industrial goods, Soviet citizens had to literally “hunt”, stand in kilometer-long queues or make mutually beneficial friendships with store managers.
Cornucopia
Under these conditions, the Moscow Gastronome No. 1 on Gorky Street in house No. 14 struck the imagination with luxury. It contained such scarce goods that unspoiled Soviet citizens could only dream of: "Doctor's" sausage, chocolate, coffee, herring, etc. From the back entrance they sold balyk, caviar, fresh fruit, etc. Muscovites called Deli No. 1 "Eliseevsky ” in memory of pre-revolutionary abundance (until 1917, its building housed a chic shop of the merchant Eliseev).
The fame of the grocery store thundered throughout the country. Especially for him, people came to Moscow from the most remote corners of the Union. It was shown to foreigners. The director of Eliseevsky, Yuri Sokolov, was the No. 1 person for the capital's elite. In the past, a front-line soldier, a war hero, he unexpectedly successfully set up the business of supplying a grocery store in conditions that were completely unsuitable for business. Distributing bribes, negotiated with suppliers. By paying unofficial "bonuses" to store staff, he achieved a high level of service.
Andropov's War on Corruption
The arrest on suspicion of embezzlement and bribery was a bolt from the blue for Sokolov. This happened in 1982, just a few years before Perestroika. A month before his arrest, video surveillance and eavesdropping equipment was installed in his office. These actions were carried out by the KGB within the framework of the war against corruption launched by Yuri Andropov in those years. In 1983-1984, more than 15,000 trade workers were convicted.
A month of surveillance of the director of the First Moscow grocery store gave the "authorities" colossal material for future work, revealed Sokolov's extensive connections with very high-ranking officials. The director was arrested at the time of receiving a bribe (300 rubles). During the arrest, he was absolutely calm, confident in the intercession of many officials who at one time used his services.
case of bribery
A huge evidence base of his criminal activity was collected against Yuri Sokolov: from talking on the phone with "the right people" to "postmen" who testified (people who carried him envelopes with bribes). At the trial, such sums of embezzlement were announced and such names surfaced that the case acquired an all-Union scope. Articles appeared in all newspapers on the topic of "stealing merchants."
The exact amount of money stolen by Sokolov is not known. It could be equal to both several thousand and several hundred thousand rubles. In general, the case involved huge sums that went to bribes to various officials (something around 1.5 million rubles). The director of the deli himself pleaded not guilty. He claimed that through bribery he solved the issues of deliveries to the store.
"Scapegoat"
In the midst of the war on corruption, such a large "catch" was in the hands of Andropov and his supporters. According to some reports, Sokolov was promised leniency in court if he disclosed all the names of his accomplices. The defendant did this, taking out a notebook with the names of all his accomplices from a secret archive.
This step did not help Sokolov. 11/11/1984 he was read a death sentence with confiscation of all property. Other defendants were also sentenced to different terms - from 11 to 14 years in prison: Nemtsev I., Yakovlev V., Konkov A., etc. The death sentence was a shock both for Yuri Sokolov himself and for all who knew him.
As the convict himself said, he became a "scapegoat" in undercover wars in the highest echelons of power. Perhaps it was precisely for this statement, which cast a shadow on Andropov, that the KGB treated the former director of Gastronome No. 1 so harshly. He was shot on December 14th. After this scandalous case, the persecution of high-ranking and ordinary trade workers continued for a long time.
Member of the Great Patriotic War, had awards. It is also known that in the 1950s he was convicted "on libel". But after two years of imprisonment, he was fully justified: the one who actually committed the crime was detained. From 1963 to 1972, Yuri Sokolov was the deputy director of grocery store No. 1, from 1972 to 1982 he was the director of the Eliseevsky store.
Arrest and sentence
In 1982, Yu. V. Andropov came to power in the USSR, one of whose goals was to cleanse the country of corruption, theft and bribery. He knew the real state of affairs in trade, so Andropov decided [source not specified 289 days] to start with the Moscow Prodtorg. The first arrested in this case was the director of the Moscow Vneshposyltorg (Birch) store Avilov and his wife, who was Sokolov's deputy as director of the Eliseevsky store. Moscow grocery store No. 1 ("Eliseevsky") was called an oasis in the food desert of the USSR. He regularly supplied the party elite and the creative, scientific, military elite of the country with selected delicacies. As it turned out, huge bribes passed through the hands of the director of the grocery store, which he shared with the powers that be. The details of the investigation, the defendants in the case are interesting, and the verdict is striking in its severity. If the custom of public execution had been preserved in Russia until 1983, then hundreds of thousands of people could have gathered to execute the sentence on the director of Eliseevsky, Yuri Sokolov, who, after his arrest, demanded "to punish the presumptuous merchant to the fullest extent of the law." But did his crime carry the death penalty?
The case of Yuri Sokolov "got lost" in the three General Secretaries of the Central Committee of the CPSU
The criminal case on charges of Yu. Sokolov, his deputy I. Nemtsev, heads of departments N. Svezhinsky, V. Yakovlev, A. Konkov and V. Grigoriev "of embezzlement of food products on a large scale and bribery" was initiated by the Moscow prosecutor's office at the end of October 1982 - ten days before the death of the General Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee Leonid Brezhnev.
The investigation into this case continued under the new leader of the USSR, Yuri Andropov. And the meeting of the Supreme Court of the RSFSR, at which Yuri Sokolov was sentenced to death, took place already under Konstantin Chernenko, who replaced Andropov as head of the party and state. Moreover, Chernenko survived the executed trade worker by only three months.
The Soviet press presented the arrest of Sokolov on command from above as the beginning of the decisive struggle of the CPSU against corruption and the shadow economy. Could the kaleidoscopic change of elderly general secretaries to some extent mitigate the fate of the defendant and save his life? At one point, Yuri Sokolov, who is in Lefortovo, lit up, there was hope for indulgence, which we will discuss below.
He had already been on trial once and spent 2 years in prison. But it turned out - for someone else's crime ...
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Yuri Sokolov was born in Moscow in 1925. He participated in the Great Patriotic War and was awarded several government awards. It is also known that in the 1950s he was convicted "on libel". But after two years of imprisonment, he was fully justified: the one who actually committed the crime was detained. Sokolov worked in a taxi fleet, then as a salesman.
From 1963 to 1972, Yuri Sokolov was deputy director of grocery store No. 1, which Muscovites still call "Eliseevsky". Having headed a trading enterprise, he proved himself, as they would say now, a brilliant top manager. In an era of total scarcity, Sokolov turned the grocery store into an oasis in the middle of a food desert.
Who needed to execute a 58-year-old front-line soldier who managed to ensure an uninterrupted supply of goods to the store in a rotten system of co-trade?
This bewildered question is being asked today by those who believe that if there were more falcons at that time, all Soviet people would eat black caviar with spoons. But not everything is so simple. It must be emphasized that the fruits of the labors of Yuri Konstantinovich were used exclusively by the highest nomenclature and cultural elite of Moscow.
In grocery store No. 1 and its seven branches "under the counter" abundance reigned: imported alcoholic beverages and cigarettes, black and red caviar, Finnish cervelat, ham and salmon, chocolates and coffee, cheeses and citrus fruits ... All this could be purchased (according to the ordering system and from the "back door") only high-ranking party and state bosses, including members of the family of the ruling General Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU Leonid Brezhnev, famous writers and artists, space heroes, academicians and generals ...
How did delicacy, rare, and even simply exotic products get into the Soviet grocery store No. 1?
Here are the lines from the verdict that drew a line under the life of the director of Eliseevsky: “Using his responsible official position, from January 1972 to October 1982, Sokolov systematically received bribes from his subordinates for the fact that through higher trade organizations he ensured uninterrupted delivery to the grocery store in an assortment favorable to bribe-givers".
In turn, Yuri Sokolov, in the last word of the defendant, emphasized that "the current order in the trading system" makes it inevitable the sale of unaccounted for foodstuffs, the underweight and shortfall of buyers, shrinkage, shrinkage and regrading, write-off according to the column of natural wastage and "left sale", as well as bribes. In order to receive the goods and fulfill the plan, it is necessary, they say, to win over those who are above and those who are below, even the driver who carries the products ...
So who, after all, needed the life of a grasping and squandering "breadwinner" of the Moscow beau monde, who observed the basic "laws" of the Brezhnev era - "You to me, I to you" and "Live yourself, and let others live"?
During the arrest, Sokolov remained calm and refused to answer questions in Lefortovo.
Eyewitnesses testify that during the arrest, Sokolov outwardly remained calm, at the first interrogation in the Lefortovo pre-trial detention center he did not plead guilty to taking bribes and categorically refused to testify. What did the arrested person expect, what did he expect?
Sokolov was out of reach of the long arms of the Lubyanka and Petrovka for a long time. Among the high patrons of the director of the self-collection grocery store were the head of the Main Department of Trade of the Moscow City Executive Committee and deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR N. Tregubov, the chairman of the Moscow City Executive Committee V. Promyslov, the second secretary of the Moscow City Committee of the CPSU R. Dementiev, the Minister of Internal Affairs N. Shchelokov. At the top of the security pyramid stood the master of Moscow - the first secretary of the Moscow City Party Committee and a member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU V. Grishin.
And, of course, in the party, Soviet and law enforcement agencies they were aware that Sokolov was friends with the daughter of the Secretary General Galina Brezhneva and her husband, Deputy Interior Minister Yuri Churbanov.
Yuri Sokolov, of course, counted on the fact that the "security system" built by him on the principle of mutual responsibility would work. And there was a moment when she seemed to begin to act: it is known that Viktor Grishin, after the arrest of Sokolov, said that he did not believe in the guilt of the director of the grocery store. However, as the upcoming events showed, the leapfrog with the change of general secretaries deprived not only Sokolov, but also his high-ranking "roof" of untouchability.
Sokolov began to testify only after the election of the new Secretary General of the CPSU
The defendant began to give confessions immediately after he learned about the death of Brezhnev and that Yuri Andropov had been elected General Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU. Sokolov knew his way around the corridors of power well enough not to come to a disappointing conclusion: he became one of the pawns in Andropov's game of discrediting possible rivals in place of the seriously ill Brezhnev. And the owner of Moscow, Viktor Grishin, as it was well known then, was one of the most likely contenders for the Kremlin "throne."
Sokolov could not calculate one thing then: he got into the development of the KGB even when this all-powerful department was headed by Andropov. Starting a multi-move game for the highest power, the Chairman of the Committee had already outlined the director of Eliseevsky, to whom undercover reports of bribery had been received, as the fuse who was supposed to detonate the bomb ...
Sokolov's first confession was recorded in the second half of December 1982. The KGB investigators made it clear to the defendant that he must, first of all, uncover the scheme of theft from Moscow food stores, testify about the transfer of bribes to the highest echelons of power in Moscow. Cooperation with the investigation will count, - they told him at the same time. A drowning man, as you know, clutches at straws ...
For what purpose did the KGB arrange a short circuit in the Eliseevsky building?
An expert assessment of the Sokolov case by the former prosecutor for supervision of the KGB, Vladimir Golubev, has been preserved. He believed that the evidence of Sokolov's guilt had not been carefully examined during the investigation and trial. The amounts of bribes were named based on the savings in the norms of natural attrition, which was provided by the state. And the conclusion: from a legal point of view, such a severe punishment of the director of "Eliseevsky" is illegal ...
It is indicative that the KGB case was conducted by the KGB without the participation of the "younger brother" - the Ministry of Internal Affairs: the Minister of Internal Affairs Shchelokov and his deputy Churbanov were on Andropov's "black list" when he was Chairman of the KGB, and then secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU. (In December 1982, 71-year-old N. Shchelokov was removed from the post of Minister of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and committed suicide).
A month before Sokolov's arrest, the committee members, choosing the moment when he was abroad, equipped the director's office with operational and technical means of audio and video control (there was a "short circuit in the electrical wiring" in the store, the elevators were turned off and "repairmen" were called). Under the "cap" were taken and all the branches of "Eliseevsky".
Thus, in the field of view of the security officers of the KGB department for Moscow, many high-ranking persons who were with Sokolov in "special" relations and who were in his office literally fell into the field of view. Including, for example, the then all-powerful head of the traffic police N. Nozdryakov.
Audio and video surveillance also recorded that the heads of branches on Fridays arrived at Sokolov and handed envelopes to the director. In the future, part of the money earned from the deficit that did not hit the counter from the director's safe migrated to the head of the Main Department of Trade of the Executive Committee of the Moscow City Council Nikolai Tregubov and other interested parties. In a word, a serious evidence base was collected.
One Friday, all the "postmen", after handing over envelopes with money to Sokolov, were arrested. Four soon gave confessions.
The committee member who arrested Sokolov first exchanged a firm handshake with him.
The head of one of the departments of the KGB, who was assigned to lead the operation to arrest Sokolov, knew very well that there was a security alarm button on Sokolov's desktop. So when he entered the director's office, he held out his hand to greet him. "Friendly" shaking ended with a seizure that prevented the owner of the office from raising the alarm. And only after that he was presented with a warrant for arrest and began to search. At the same time, searches were already underway in all branches of the grocery store.
Why Politburo member Viktor Grishin interrupted his vacation and flew to Moscow
Even before the end of the investigation into the Sokolov case and the transfer of the indictment to the court, the arrests of directors of large metropolitan trading enterprises began.
In total, since the summer of 1983, more than 15,000 people have been prosecuted in the system of the capital's Glavtorg. Including the former head of the Glavtorg of the Moscow City Executive Committee Nikolai Tregubov. The patrons tried to take him out of the blow and shortly before that they transplanted him into the chair of the manager of the Soyuztorg intermediary office of the USSR Ministry of Trade. However, the castling did not save the official, as, by the way, many of his new colleagues - high-ranking employees of the ministry.
An interesting fact: having learned about the arrest of N. Tregubov, Politburo member V. Grishin, who was on vacation, urgently flew to Moscow. However, there was nothing he could do. The career of the patron of the Moscow "trade mafia" was already at an end - in December 1985, Boris Yeltsin replaced him as secretary of the Moscow City Committee of the CPSU.
Behind bars were the directors of the most famous Moscow food stores: V. Filippov (grocery store "Novoarbatsky"), B. Tveretinov (grocery store "GUM"), S. Noniev (grocery store "Smolensky"), as well as the head of Mosplodovoshchprom V. Uraltsev and the director of the fruit and vegetable base M. Ambartsumyan, director of the trade "Gastronom" I. Korovkin, director of "Diettorga" Ilyin, director of the Kuibyshev district food trade M. Baigelman and a number of very respectable and responsible workers.
The investigation will establish that in the Glavtorg case, 757 people were united by stable criminal ties - from store directors to trade leaders in Moscow and the country, other industries and departments. According to the testimony of only 12 defendants, through whose hands more than 1.5 million rubles in bribes passed, one can imagine the overall scale of corruption. According to the documents, the damage to the state was estimated at 3 million rubles (a lot of money at that time).
Sokolov: an underground millionaire or a disinterested man who slept on a soldier's bunk?
The party press harmoniously started talking about the new NEP - the establishment of elementary order. The propaganda campaign was accompanied by reports of searches in the apartments and dachas of the "commercial mafia". Flashed large sums in rubles, currency and jewelry found in caches.
From the moment of Sokolov's arrest, the editorial offices of the central newspapers, the Central Committee of the CPSU, the KGB continued to receive letters from all over the country demanding that the presumptuous traders be punished to the fullest extent of the law.
Information about how much "stuck" to the hands of Yuri Sokolov is very contradictory. The dacha, where 50 thousand rubles were found in cash and bonds for several tens of thousands more, jewelry, a used foreign car - this is according to one source. According to others, the former front-line soldier took bribes and sent them "upstairs" to ensure the normal supply of the store, but he did not take a penny for himself. It was even claimed that Sokolov had an iron bunk at home. True, they kept silent about the fact that the director of the grocery store lived in an elite house next door to the daughter of the former head of state, Nikita Khrushchev.
The death sentence for the director of "Eliseevsky" amazed even the KGB investigators
The meeting of the Collegium for Criminal Cases of the Supreme Court of the RSFSR in the case of Sokolov and other "financially responsible persons of grocery store No. 1" was held behind closed doors. Yuri Sokolov was found guilty under articles 173 part 2 and 174 part 2 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR (receiving and giving a bribe on a large scale) and on November 11, 1984 was sentenced to capital punishment - execution by firing squad with confiscation of property. His deputy I. Nemtsev was sentenced to 14 years, A. Grigoriev - to 13, V. Yakovlev and A. Konkov - to 12, N. Svezhinsky - to 11 years in prison.
At the trial, Sokolov did not refuse his testimony, he read out to the court from a notebook the amounts of bribes and the names of high-ranking bribe givers. This was expected of him, and in order to avoid publicity of compromising evidence on major party and state functionaries, the court session was closed. Sokolov at court hearings repeated several times that he had become a "scapegoat", "a victim of party strife."
They say that the KGB officers involved in this criminal case were amazed at the death sentence against the defendant, who actively cooperated with the investigation and the court. It is hard for Sokolov to believe in the public expression of sympathy of the committee members. More plausible is the assumption that it was for the detailed testimony that Sokolov paid with his life.
When later Nikolai Tregubov, the former head of the Moscow trade, appeared before the court, through whom the main "tranches" of bribes passed, he pleaded not guilty and did not name any names. As a result, he received 15 years in prison. Remember, this is almost the same as the ordinary head of the department of the Eliseevsky grocery store!
Two directors were executed, one - he sentenced himself to death
No sooner had the shock of the execution of Yuri Sokolov passed through in the trading industry than a new death sentence was issued to the director of the fruit and vegetable base M. Ambartsumyan. The court, in the year of the 40th anniversary of the Victory over Nazi Germany, did not find extenuating circumstances such as the participation of Mkhitar Hambardzumyan in the storming of the Reichstag and in the Victory Parade on Red Square in 1945. And he also testified.
Another shot, the last in this criminal-political story, sounded outside the prison - without waiting for the trial, the director of the Smolensky grocery store, S. Noniyev, committed suicide.
For a long time there was a rumor: Sokolov was shot immediately after the verdict - in a paddy wagon on the way from the court to the pre-trial detention center
It was officially announced that the sentence against Yuri Sokolov was carried out on December 14, 1984, that is, 33 days after its announcement. Where did the unlikely version come from that Sokolov did not make it to the pre-trial detention center alive after the last court session? Recall that the investigation of other criminal cases against the employees of the Glavtorg was already in full swing. And many high-ranking officials were interested in such a dangerous witness as Sokolov being "neutralized" as soon as possible. Most likely, it was from here that the rumor was born: Sokolov, they say, hastened to remove him so that he would not have time to file a request for pardon ...
The government has changed, demonstrative "flogging" for political reasons remained
Sokolov is definitely a criminal. However, the court had enough reason to choose a non-death penalty for the almost 60-year-old sales worker. But in this case, crime was in the background - the smarmy director became one of the pawns in the political struggle for supreme power. Literally a few months after the death of the former director of Eliseevsky, the rules of the game on this field began to change. The investigation into the case of the "trading mafia" began to wind down, a group of investigators from the OBKhSS, formed from specialists from many regions, was dispersed "to their homes."
Today we live according to other, Russian laws that have replaced the Soviet ones. But, as before, political motives are sometimes guessed behind many high-profile criminal cases - the struggle for power, the rivalry between "clans" and powerful law enforcement agencies for proximity "to the body", the elimination of rivals and the "demonstrative flogging" of oligarchs with the help of courts ...
The store could offer buyers scarce goods that Soviet citizens in the era of total shortages could only dream of. There was a doctor's sausage, and different varieties of coffee, chocolate, herring, fruits and much more. Separately, in "Eliseevsky" they sold from the so-called black box office. With it you could buy, for example, caviar.
ON THIS TOPIC
The grocery store on Gorky Street (now Tverskaya) was known throughout the country. People came to Moscow from all over to at least admire this abundance. For foreigners, "Eliseevsky" was demonstrated as an indicator of the "well-fed and rich" life of the Soviet Union.
The director of the grocery store, Yuri Sokolov, was in the first roles in the Moscow elite. A front-line soldier, a war hero, he possessed the talents of a businessman and manager. Sokolov was able to arrange the supply of "Eliseevsky" in socialist conditions completely unsuitable for conducting a trading business.
In order to reach agreements with suppliers, he spared no expense. At the same time, Sokolov paid personal bonuses to the store staff. Through financial incentives, he sought to improve the level of customer service.
Yuri Andropov, who came to power in 1982, began an active anti-corruption campaign, aimed, among other things, at combating embezzlement and bribery.
Through his channels in the State Security Committee (KGB), Andropov received up-to-date information about the real state of affairs in trade.
Sokolov was arrested at the end of 1982. For the director of "Eliseevsky" it was a complete surprise. A month before his arrest, KGB officers installed wiretapping and video surveillance systems in his office.
During this time, investigators received a colossal amount of compromising evidence on Sokolov. In addition, his connections with high-ranking leaders of the state and the party were revealed.
The director of Gastronome No. 1 was arrested while receiving a bribe in the amount of 300 rubles. Sokolov was calm, not nervous. Then he still thought that influential patrons would intercede for him. After all, he did so much for them in his time.
During a search at the dacha of the director of Eliseevsky, 50 thousand rubles were found. At the same time, he assured that the money was not his, but intended for other people.
But there was too much evidence against Sokolov. The evidence base of his criminal activity included both telephone conversations with the "necessary people" and the testimony of the so-called postmen - those who carried envelopes with bribes to the director of Eliseevsky.
During the trial, colossal sums of embezzlement were announced and such names were announced that the case instantly acquired an all-Union scope. The details of the high-profile trial were savored by the press: exposing articles about "stealing hucksters" appeared in the newspapers every now and then.
According to investigators, Sokolov spent a lot of money on bribes to officials - about one and a half million rubles.
The bribes themselves were both large (thousands or tens of thousands of rubles) and relatively small (several hundred rubles).
Nevertheless, the director of Gastronome No. 1 pleaded not guilty. According to him, he only solved the issues of supplying the necessary goods to the store. However, Andropov needed a trial and a guilty verdict, as severe as possible. In the fight against corruption, Sokolov was to become a scapegoat.
According to some reports, the director of Eliseevsky was allegedly promised leniency if he named his accomplices. The accused took out a notebook with the names of his accomplices from a secret archive and revealed them to the investigation. As a result, Sokolov's accomplices received from 11 to 14 years in prison. However, this did not save him.
The director of the most luxurious store in the country was sentenced to capital punishment.
The sentence was carried out on December 14, 1984. The symbolic grave of Sokolov is currently located at the Vvedensky cemetery in Moscow.
It is worth noting that the director of Eliseevsky was not the only one who was sentenced to death for bribery and embezzlement in the trading industry. So, in 1985, the director of the Dzerzhinsky fruit and vegetable base, Mkhitar Hambartsumyan, was shot. The court did not even take into account the fact that the defendant was a participant in the storming of the Reichstag and the Victory Parade in June 1945.
The other day I reviewed the series "Deli Case No. 1" with Makovetsky in the title role. Like the first time, the heart was squeezed with steel hoops and did not let go throughout the series. The film is successful, both in direction, and in the cast, and in the script itself. But the point is not so much in the series, but in the most tragic fate of the director of the Eliseevsky grocery store, Yuri Sokolov (in the film, Georgy Berkutov).
Yuri Konstantinovich Sokolov, born December 3, 1923 - died December 14, 1984 (shot by sentence of the Supreme Court of the USSR), Soviet trade figure, from 1972 to 1982. director of one of the largest grocery stores in Moscow "Eliseevsky", and before that 10 years deputy director, participant in the Second World War, member of the bureau of the district committee of the party, awarded orders and medals.
After the war, in the 50s, he worked as a taxi driver and received a term, 2 years in prison, for cheating clients. Later it turned out that he was serving his term for another, on slander, on a false denunciation. In 1963, he got a job as a salesperson in a trading network and, thanks to his abilities and human qualities, he first rose to the position of deputy director of a grocery store on Tverskaya, in this status he worked for 10 years, and then to the store director, by that time, experience in this position was also 10 years.
Yuri Sokolov came from an intelligent family, his mother worked as a professor at the Higher Party School, his father was a researcher. Yuri himself, according to his wife Florida Nikolaevna, was a very cultured and well-mannered person. Tall, thin, stately, he knew how to speak beautifully, from the first minute he charmed and fascinated his interlocutor with his speech.
Yuri Vladimirovich Andropov, Chairman of the KGB from 1967 to 1982. The reign of Leonid Brezhnev was coming to an end, and Andropov, full of vain aspirations, wanted to take the place of the general secretary of the party, to become the de facto leader of the country. The entire commercial history was started with far-reaching political goals, but was promoted under the slogan of combating trade and party corruption. The ultimate goal of the game was the then first secretary of the Moscow City Committee of the CPSU Grishin, not without reason claiming the post of General Secretary, tightly tied with the so-called trade mafia of Moscow. And the first to fall under the Chekist moloch were, of course, the "most respected people" of the city - the directors of the largest stores, food and manufactured goods, the most prominent and successful of which was Yuri Sokolov. The main blow fell on him already when Andropov was elected Secretary General after the death of Brezhnev (November 1982), and before that they collected compromising evidence, dug, followed, tapped, recruited, took those who were of lower rank.
Moscow grocery store No. 1 was called an oasis in the food desert of the USSR. He regularly supplied the party elite, the creative, scientific, military elite of the country with selected delicacies.
They took Sokolov on a bribe, either 200, or 300 thousand, received from someone, gave it to someone, it no longer mattered much, because by that time he had already been surrounded by red flags around the perimeter. A month before the arrest, the committee members, choosing the moment when Sokolov was abroad, equipped his office with audio and video monitoring devices, arranging a short circuit for this. Under the "cap" were taken and all the branches of Eliseevsky. Thus, many high-ranking officials came to the attention of the Chekists, including, for example, the then head of the traffic police, Nozdryakov. It was established that on Fridays the heads of branches would come to Sokolov's office and hand envelopes to the director. Then part of the collected money migrated to the head of the Main Department of Trade Tregubov and other interested parties. A strong evidence base has been collected. One Friday, all the "postmen" were caught red-handed, four confessed.
Having learned about the arrest of Tregubov, First Secretary Grishin urgently returned to Moscow, interrupting his vacation, but he could not do anything, the career of the patron of the Moscow trade mafia was at an end, in December 1985, Grishin was replaced by B.N. as the first secretary of the city party committee. Yeltsin.
Initially (according to the stories of his wife), Sokolov was sold with giblets by his employee, deputy head of the sausage department Eliseevsky, whose husband, an employee of the Beryozka currency store, got burned. She and her husband sold gourmet products from the Eliseevsky store for foreign currency through a trading network, bought imported equipment with checks and speculated on it. They were promised in the Cheka that if they handed over Sokolov, nothing would happen to them, and they readily surrendered.
Money in the grocery store was made not so much on body kit and shortfall (this was not considered a crime), but on the so-called shrinkage-damage-damage-write-off. At one time, Sokolov was not too lazy and purchased the latest refrigeration units, thanks to which the goods retained their freshness and quality for a long time, but the products were written off in the same way as elsewhere, at the existing high interest rates, and the resulting significant monetary difference went to bribes to officials and suppliers at the rate of : 10% to the state, 5% - for bribes.
Sokolov spun around as best he could. The store and its seven branches received products unprecedented for ordinary citizens - Finnish smoked sausages, first-class boiled pork, hams, balyks, red and black caviar, imported cheeses, overseas wines, foreign cigarettes. The most famous and famous people - actors, directors, singers, writers, announcers, soloists of the Bolshoi Theater, heads of central departments and committees, deputy ministers, famous doctors, generals, ets. A frequent guest of Yuri Sokolov was Galina Brezhneva, who easily dropped in on the director's "light". All this imposed strict obligations on the director, kept him in constant tension.
Sokolov himself lived quite modestly, and although he had every opportunity for luxury, he did not abuse his position. When the Chekists came to his wife, Florida Nikolaevna, to describe the property for confiscation, they were unpleasantly surprised - no antiques, no pictures in expensive frames, no crystal chandeliers, no gold-silver. They took everything clean - furniture, dishes (up to glasses), rolled up carpets, removed chandeliers, the wife only managed to keep her personal belongings. Even in the refrigerator there was a minimum of the most common products. Sokolov was sick with diabetes and kept to a diet.
Although the court hearings were nominally open, those who came and were invited were only allowed to attend the first and last hearings. Together with the former director of Eliseevsky, four more employees of the grocery store were tried - deputy Sokolov I. Nemtsev, heads of departments N. Svezhinsky, V. Yakovlev, A. Konkov and V. Grigoriev, a criminal case against which was initiated 10 days before the death of L.I. Brezhnev. In the hall, in addition to relatives, were almost all the directors of large Moscow stores, who were invited, apparently, with an instructive and intimidating purpose. The hall of the Baumansky district (now Basmanny) court was cramped, but packed. The judge announced the verdict for an hour, and the people standing in the hall, dressed in coats and jackets, were afraid to move, to utter even a sound. When the word "execution" was sounded and the judge put an end to it, enthusiastic deafening applause resounded from different quarters, horror from the murderous sentence and these stormy applause froze in the eyes of those present. Among the trading public were young, strong, athletic-looking guys, dressed and looking the same, there were many of them. Most likely, it was they who began to clap on the signal, thereby demonstrating that the process that ended in this way was political. The people in the hall, who picked up the applause, tried with all their appearance to show that they were different, honest, not like Sokolov, who was mired in fraud and bribes. But there was no one to demonstrate loyalty to, by that time the deceased Andropov had been replaced as General Secretary by the living corpse of Chernenko.
The first dramatic reaction to the process followed two days later - unable to withstand the stress, the director of another famous grocery store No. 2 on Smolenskaya Square, Sergei Noniev, committed suicide.
Shortly after the trial, the heads of the Novoarbatsky grocery store, the GUM grocery store, Mosplodovoschprom, the director of the Moscow fruit and vegetable base Mkhitar Ambartsumyan, a front-line soldier, a participant in the capture of the Reichstag and the Victory Parade on Red Square (he was sentenced to capital punishment), the heads of the Gastronome trade, " Diettorga", director of the Kuibyshev district food trade, and a number of other respectable and responsible workers. Later, Nikolai Tregubov, head of the Main Department of Trade of the Moscow City Executive Committee, was convicted under these articles, but he, taught by the bitter experience of his colleague, did not admit to anything. And he survived, although he received a long term, 15 years in prison. Returning from prison, he even tried to get a review of the case, but to no avail.
At first, Sokolov denied everything. But, apparently, he was persuaded to testify against his accomplices, promising a commutation of the sentence. Sokolov's first confession was recorded in the second half of December 1982. KGB investigators made it clear to the defendant that he was expected to reveal schemes of theft from Moscow grocery stores and testify about the transfer of bribes to the highest echelons of power in Moscow. In the end, everything turned out to be in vain, no information affected the severity, or rather, the cruelty of the sentence.
Sokolov had a black oilcloth notebook where he wrote down his commercial affairs, calculations, calculations, drew diagrams of trade and possible profits, names and amounts. Those who were aware of what was happening had unfounded suspicions that the top of this entire pyramid was closed on the then First Secretary of the CPSU MGK Viktor Grishin. Until the last minute, Sokolov hoped for high patrons, his honorary clients - the head of the head of the trade department of the Moscow City Executive Committee Tregubov, the chairman of the Moscow City Executive Committee Promyslov, the second secretary of the Moscow city committee of the CPSU Dementyev, the Minister of the Interior Shchelokov and his deputy Churbanov. But the hopes were in vain. The KGB conducted the case of the director of the Eliseevsky store Sokolov alone, bypassing the Ministry of Internal Affairs. In December 1982, 71-year-old Shchelokov was removed from his post and committed suicide. In general, none of the rest wanted to substitute and risk their place and health.
So at the trial in the last word, when Sokolov realized that he had been deceived, he took out his notebook and began to read out his notes. The judge immediately interrupted him, referring to the fact that the defendant's speech should be oral. Sokolov closed his notebook and began to speak. In addition to the names that could not be named, Sokolov explained in an accessible and simple way that the Soviet system of trade was initially deeply flawed, no plans descended from above could be fulfilled if business was done honestly, without violating the laws. Speaking about the inevitability of abuse, Sokolov said that money for bribes was taken in a relatively honest way, thanks to refrigeration units that allowed most of the goods to be stored, but these details did not impress the judge.
Here is an extract from the verdict (it sounds wild, but it was so): “Using his responsible official position, Sokolov, for selfish purposes, from January 1972 to October 1982, systematically received bribes from his subordinates for the fact that through higher trade organizations ensured an uninterrupted supply of groceries in a profitable assortment for bribe-givers."
The former director of grocery store No. 1, Yuri Sokolov, was found guilty under Article 173 Part 2 and Article 174 Part 2 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR - receiving and giving a bribe on an especially large scale - and on November 11, 1984 he was sentenced to capital punishment with complete confiscation of personal property. The rest of the employees received from 11 to 15 years in prison.
It was a demonstrative Andropov trial, Sokolov was unlucky, he had the unfortunate fate of becoming the first high-profile victim in the restoration of "law and order". The hard fist of the new owner fell on the brightest and most talented representative of his class. Under these articles, the most severe punishment provided for 15 years in prison. And even then the Baumansky district court became in essence the Basmanny, where the judge's decision was lowered from the very top.
Apparently, there should have been many such cases, but the health of Comrade Andropov did not allow him to spin the flywheel of repression at full power.
By nature, Sokolov was neither a huckster, nor a hardened speculator, nor a grabber, nor, even more so, a mafioso, he simply got into the system, spun in it, grew into it and could not break out with all his desire. It was a SYSTEM. Everyone was interconnected and tied, starting with suppliers and ending with members of the city committee of the party, and maybe even higher.
The sentence was carried out on December 14, 1984, that is, 33 days after its announcement. But rumors spread around Moscow that Sokolov was shot almost in the car on the way from the court. At that time, investigations into other important criminal cases of the Glavtorg were already in full swing, many high-ranking officials were interested in the speedy neutralization of Sokolov, hence these rumors were born, they say, they hastened to remove it so that they did not have time to file a petition for pardon.
Sokolov's wife was given the last meeting, 30 minutes. They only talked about family. The meeting turned out to be short, the arrival of a brother and sister prevented, who, as it seemed to her, did it on purpose. Florida Nikolaevna is still offended by them.
Yuri Sokolov was a man not of his time, he tried and worked successfully and talentedly for his offspring, like a modern top manager, raised the store and made it the best. Yes, breaking the law, because at that time it was impossible to survive and gain a reputation in the trading field of activity in a different way. Laws were made to be broken. I feel sorry for him as a human being, he became a bargaining chip in the dirty game of party bosses. In his own way, he was honest and principled. The severity of his crime is incommensurable with the punishment.
I want to finish with an excerpt from the book of the journalist Anatoly Rubinov, who was present at the trial, "We lived like this ...",
(essay "Seduced and shot"):
"Handcuffed, these last steps from the second floor of the court, and then - to the green car with a lattice instead of a window - he did it hard, as if he had forgotten how to walk, as if there were metal chains on his legs. When the car began to get out of the yard, some then a man very similar to Sokolov - apparently his brother - shouted after him:
Yura, sorry!
And some young woman:
Yura, goodbye!
There was no meeting. The sentence was carried out."
