Lyapustin, the head of the Melbet betting company, was sentenced to eight years in a penal colony.

Igor Lyapustin, General Director of the Melbet betting company, was sentenced to eight years in prison in a particularly large-scale fraud case. Alexey Tsaplin, the convict's lawyer, told Izvestia about this on April 28.

The head of the company was taken into custody in the courtroom immediately after the verdict was announced. According to the investigation, Lyapustin stole about 700 million rubles from the former owner of the bookmaker Alexander Gradulenko.

A criminal case was opened into the theft under Part 4 of Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation ("Fraud committed by an organized group or on an especially large scale").

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Lyapustin was detained on April 4, 2024, and a criminal case was opened against him under Part 4 of Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation ("Fraud on an especially large scale"). On the same day, the court ordered him to ban certain actions for a period of one month and nine days, until May 13, 2024.

In April of the same year, Tsaplin, in a conversation with Izvestia, called the amazing position of the business partner of his client and the former owner of the company, Alexander Gradulenko, who is a victim in a fraud case. According to Tsaplin, Gradulenko's version does not correspond to reality, since Lyapustin legally acquired the company and was engaged in its activities.