Former Sochi mayor sentenced to 15 years for large-scale bribery and embezzlement

Alexei Kopaygorodsky, who served as mayor of the Black Sea resort city of Sochi from September 2019 until his abrupt resignation in May 2024, was handed a 15-year maximum-security prison sentence after a Moscow court found him guilty of large-scale bribery, embezzlement of municipal property and laundering criminal proceeds. Prosecutors alleged he accepted more than 319 million rubles in bribes from developers between 2022 and 2024 and concealed two municipal land plots.

The Meshchansky District Court also stripped him of a state medal, imposed a 14.5-year ban on holding any public-management role, and levied a half-billion-ruble fine on each of him and his wife. Yanina Kopaygorodskaya was sentenced to 10 years for acting as an accomplice, while their aide Alexander Pasunko was fined 190,000 rubles. Earlier, a Sochi court seized the family’s assets exceeding 1.6 billion rubles. Kopaygorodsky had been captured in the Russian-occupied Luhansk region in September 2024 after joining a volunteer battalion.