Investment firm asks Putin to take control of U.S. founder's case

Russian private equity group Baring Vostok asked President Vladimir Putin on Monday to take personal control of the criminal case against its U.S. founder Michael Calvey.

Russian President Vladimir Putin listens during a meeting in the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, Monday, Feb. 25, 2019. [Photo: Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP/Mikhail Klimentyev]

Calvey and five other executives were detained on the suspicion of embezzling 2.5 billion rubles (about 37.5 million U.S. dollars) earlier this month. Prosecutors formally charged Calvey last week.

"To ensure a comprehensive, independent and objective investigation of this criminal case, we hereby ask that you take personal control of the criminal case," Baring Vostok said in an open letter to Putin.

Russian courts and law enforcement authorities in recent years have reduced the use of imprisonment as a form of pretrial detention for cases related to commercial activities, the company said.

This approach has helped eliminate the possibility of putting undue pressure on a business partner as part of a business conflict, it said.

Founder of the Baring Vostok investment fund Michael Calvey looks through a cage's class in the court room in Moscow, Russia, Saturday, Feb. 16, 2019. [File photo: AP/Alexander Zemlianichenko]

Despite these legal requirements, Calvey and other senior managers of Baring Vostok have been imprisoned during the pretrial period, the open letter read.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told the press Monday that Putin had not seen the letter, but he would be shown it. "It's a major case and it is under special control in the agencies that are investigating it," Peskov added.