£200,000 Thrown From Car

During a police chase recently a Russian official threw £200,000 in high denomination notes, out of his car window in Moscow.

Boris Simonov was being chased by federal agents because him and his boss, Roman Postnikov had been accused of taking bribes and they wanted to capture and arrest them. They both work for Federal Fisheries Agency and it has been alleged that they took bribes from businessmen to allow them to get hold of an illegally back-dated contract to allow them to charge fishermen to use certain reservoirs on the outskirts of Moscow, to catch fish.

When the two officials were pursued by the police in Moscow along a very busy road, Boris Sominov crashed the Cadillac they were travelling in, reported to be worth seven million roubles, and then flung £200,000 worth of roubles, in large bundles, out of the window where it was blown around by the wind. He was trying to throw away the money, which presumably was the payment he had received for allowing the illegal contract through. It seemed that they were returning from a meeting with some businessmen when the federal security service agents chased and then arrested them.

The chase was televised and the state-run television First channel also showed footage of police collecting the rouble notes and dropping them in a cardboard from around the Moscow highway where the crash took place. Members of the public had also helped out and they had handed notes in that they had collected to the police. The notes were all of very high denominations and they were scattered alongside the thoroughfare where the crash had taken place. It also showed pictures of the two officials hand cuffed and lying on the road after the police arrested them. The car was shown, all smashed up, beside them.