The Moscow Regional Court has closed the criminal case against Vitaly Lopota, former head of RKK Energia. He was accused of abuse of power causing over 40 million rubles in damages related to the `Sea Launch` project.
«The criminal case has been terminated due to the expiration of the statute of limitations for criminal prosecution,» the court stated.
The case was received by the court in October, and nearly twenty sessions were held.
Lopota was charged under Part 2, Article 201 of the Russian Criminal Code (Abuse of official powers), which carries a potential sentence of up to 10 years in prison.
According to the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation, the top manager abused his authority by providing loans to companies involved in the `Sea Launch` project. Investigators estimated the damage at 41 million rubles.
In August 2014, Lopota was removed from his position as president of RKK Energia, one of Russia`s leading space industry enterprises. He later took the post of vice-president of the United Rocket and Space Corporation but soon left that position as well.
The `Sea Launch` project was established in 1995 to operate an offshore space launch complex. It went through bankruptcy and reorganization in 2009. In 2014, launches were suspended after 36 missions due to events in Ukraine, where the Zenit rockets used by the floating cosmodrome were manufactured.
In 2016, S7 Group purchased the `Sea Launch` project`s assets, including the Sea Launch Commander command ship and the Odyssey mobile launch platform.
In March 2020, the complex was transported to Slavyanka port in Primorye. In late April, S7 head Vladislav Filev announced that the `Sea Launch` project was frozen until better times. Around the same time, it became known that `Roscosmos` had tasked its enterprises with conducting an economic feasibility study for restarting `Sea Launch` operations with launches potentially resuming from 2024.
Yuri Borisov, who headed `Roscosmos` from 2022 to 2025, had stated, while he was still a Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Federation, that the offshore cosmodrome could resume launches in 2023-2024, however, this did not happen.
