A guide was convicted in Kamchatka for the deaths of nine people on Klyuchevskaya Sopka.

In the Kamchatka Territory, a guide was sentenced to 4.5 years for the deaths of nine people on Klyuchevsky volcano in September 2022. The regional prosecutor's office announced this on August 14.

"The Ust-Kamchatsky district Court has issued a guilty verdict in the criminal case against the guide Ivan Alabugin. He was found guilty under Part 3 of Article 238 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation ("Provision of services that do not meet the requirements for the safety of life and health of consumers, which negligently caused the death of more than two persons")," the agency's website says.

According to the case file, Andrey Stepanov, director of the Novosibirsk travel company Extreme Time LLC, knowing about the closure and ban on tours on the Klyuchevskaya Sopka volcano, posted an advertisement about the organization of climbing a natural object.

In June 2022, Stepanov recruited Ivan Alabugin and Andrey Mishchenko, who did not have the necessary qualifications, to accompany a group of 10 tourists. On August 30, the tourists started hiking along an unapproved route and without permission to visit the nature park.

The tourists, having reached a height of 4,400 meters, began a reverse descent due to the inability to continue moving up the ice slope, during which they fell off the ice slope. As a result of the fall, eight participants of the tourist route and their accompanying instructor died due to their injuries and hypothermia.

The defendant pleaded not guilty. He was sentenced to 4 years and 6 months of imprisonment in a general regime colony. Alabugin is also prohibited from engaging in activities related to tourism activities for 3 years.

Earlier, on November 13, 2023, the court sentenced Andrei Stepanov, the organizer of the deadly volcano tour, in a criminal case for providing services that did not meet the requirements for the safety of life and health of consumers, and he was sentenced to four years in prison to be served in a general regime colony.

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