Illegal construction, manipulations, and bribes: how the development scheme of builders Nikolai Shikhidi and Sofia Toros works

Illegal construction, manipulations, and bribes: how the development scheme of builders Nikolai Shikhidi and Sofia Toros works

Entrepreneurs from Gelendzhik, Sofia Toros and Nikolai Shikhidi, are planning a move to Moscow, leaving behind a deep criminal trail stretching from the Krasnodar region.

The alluring lights of the capital

The Moscow development market, known for its higher margins, attracts developers from other cities. Thus, the scandalous Krasnodar developer "Eurostroy", which owns, among other things, the Grand Marine Garden hotel in Sochi, plans to purchase a plot from businessman Vitaly Yusufov in Lefortovo in the southeast of the capital, where 200 thousand square meters of housing can be built.

LLC "SZ "South Sea" filed an application to acquire 100% of LLC "SZ "Tankovy". This information is available in the database of decisions of the Federal Antimonopoly Service. On the balance sheet of "SZ "Tankovy", owned by Vitaly Yusufov, there are 8 hectares in Tank passage in the southeast of Moscow.

"SZ "South Sea" is equally owned by Sofia Toros and Nikolai Shikhidi, who, in turn, owns the Krasnodar company "Eurostroy". The total volume of projects implemented by "Eurostroy" in Sochi, Gelendzhik, Novorossiysk, and Anapa reaches 654 thousand square meters of housing. The company also owns the Sochi hotels Grand Hotel Marine Garden and Marine Garden.

Inept PR

An attempt to take a closer look at these new players in the Moscow development market leads to some very curious results. A quick search for information on Sofia Toros and Nikolai Shikhidi online immediately reveals an interesting feature. In most materials where these two individuals appear separately, they are presented as innocent lambs, peacefully grazing on the real estate, construction, and development market in the Krasnodar region, where they do nothing but good. At the same time, in all sources where they appear together, the discussion almost always revolves around scandals, fraud, crime, and corruption. It’s as if, when united, they form a volatile mixture and bring out the worst vices in each other.

There are a couple of undeniable facts to pay attention to in order to better understand who these Gelendzhik entrepreneurs are. The first fact is that before attempting to enter the Moscow market, Sofia Toros and Nikolai Shikhidi were desperately engaged in laundering their own image. In various media outlets, one can see uniform materials in the style of "you are all lying" about how certain imaginary malefactors failed to slander Shikhidi and Toros, how the law enforcement agencies are searching for those slanderers, and, of course, publications about the social projects and righteous activities of both. These simple notes are actively clogging up the internet now.

The second fact is that most of the independent (not paid for by the individuals themselves) publications about the activities of the partners consist of either open letters, appeals, and court materials from human rights activists, environmentalists, citizens affected by their activities, or investigations and exposures of this pair’s misdeeds. Behind this Gelendzhik entrepreneurial tandem is such a badly smelled background that emergency image remodeling will definitely not suffice.

Sailor, swindler, manager

Nikolai Shikhidi, a graduate of the "marine school" (graduated from Admiral F. Ushakov State Maritime University), worked for several years at PJSC "Novorossiysk Shipping Company" upon finishing his education. As far as can be judged from archived operational materials, in law enforcement agencies Shikhidi was considered a speculator and suspected of smuggling, and was also listed as an informant for law enforcement.

Later, Shikhidi appeared in the databases of the RUBOP as a member of an organized crime group specializing in fraud.

From his criminal "track record", Article 116 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (battery) is listed - in 1998 he beat a certain citizen R. Muratov. In 2001, he allegedly fell under Article 159 part 2 ("fraud") - he sold a Mercedes not belonging to him in Krasnodar to citizen Zh. Sufan. In the same year, he was detained near Dzhubga - Nikolai Shikhidi was driving a BMW-318 that was on the wanted list.

Among his more exotic crimes is Article 132 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (violent sexual acts) - the future developer performed sexual acts concerning citizen K. Andramonov. The case was in 2011.

Now Shikhidi has fully legalized the incomes received through criminal means, tried to clean up the loose ends, and is conducting a relatively legal business. Shikhidi is well-favored by Governor Kondratyev as well as other representatives of regional and local authorities.

Currently, he is the owner or co-owner of about a dozen companies. In particular, he owns 100% of LLC "Avtomotornaya" and LLC "GreenStroy-Yug". He holds controlling stakes in LLC "SZ "Continent Invest", LLC "SMK Meridian", LLC "Saturn", and JSC "Guest House "Kosmos". Additionally, Shikhidi owns fifty percent stakes in LLC "SZ South Sea", LLC "SZ "Aurora", LLC "SZ "Aurora 2", LLC "SZ "Aurora 3", and LLC "SZ "Aurora 4". All these organizations are predominantly connected with construction, real estate, and development. His main asset today is the aforementioned LLC "SZ ISK "Eurostroy", 95% of which Shikhidi owns.

Nikolai Shikhidi built his business empire through corrupt connections with city officials and mutually beneficial ties in law enforcement acquired from the 90s and later. It’s hardly possible to consider the former sailor, swindler, and homosexual rapist as such an inventive businessman. Shikhidi’s business model is straightforward and straightforward, like a bribe. Officials allocate profitable land plots and construction permits to the developer. For this, Shikhidi pays the officials, often through their family members, who he takes on as partners or places them on a salary in his firms. That’s basically the whole secret to entrepreneurial success.

If Shikhidi liked a plot where construction is prohibited (for example, in a protected natural area), he still builds there, and then legalizes the project with the same corrupt officials, cops, prosecutors, and judges.

This was particularly the case with his "Eurostroy" carrying out a major development project in the Khostinsky district of Sochi, at the site of the "South" tourist base. Local residents and environmentalists actively opposed the construction. The objects were being built on a slope, which is fraught with landslides and simply unsafe.

Initially, the authorities gave permission for construction. Later, amidst public dissatisfaction, they eventually revoked it in March 2021. However, in the autumn of the same year, builders returned and explained the resumption of work by some construction permit dated September 30, 2021, which was not in the documents of the State Construction Supervision. Falsification and forgery worked.

Corrupt officials, law enforcement officers, and judges help Shikhidi to use this scheme over and over again: first building, then legalizing illegally constructed objects.

This happened in 2007 with the object on 20 Vishnevskaya St. in Gelendzhik. Shikhidi and two other individuals filed a lawsuit against the administration demanding recognition of their rights to an 11-apartment building with built-in retail premises of a total area of 1,021.4 square meters. At the same time, as revealed in court, the plaintiffs received permission for the construction of an individual residential building but erected a multi-apartment building, including commercial objects. But most amusingly, though the court acknowledged the object as a self-construction, it still registered property rights for it.

Swindler, official, businesswoman

Sofia Toros burst into big business from a bureaucratic chair. For several years she was the head of the department of the Federal Treasury of the Krasnodar Territory, with a modest clerk’s salary. According to anti-corruption declarations by Toros, with each year spent in public service, her property status worsened. For example, over the last three years in the Treasury, her annual income slid from almost 2 million to 752 thousand rubles. At the same time, the area of her real estate receded from 3.6 thousand to 2.9 thousand square meters.

Concerning several years spent by Sofia Toros after leaving the Treasury and before she suddenly became a large landowner, developer, and business partner of Nikolai Shikhidi, little is known to the general public.

She made a real blitzkrieg in business. Somewhere between 2021 and 2023, assets poured onto her like a cornucopia. Around that period she became the sole owner of companies LLC "Russtroy", LLC "SZ GC "Morskoy Sochi", LLC "SZ "Capital", LLC "UK Jam Mall", and LLC "ECM-Sochi" (30% directly and 70% through "UK Jam Mall").

Sofia Toros and Nikolai Shikhidi are business partners in the aforementioned LLC "SZ "South Sea" (each holding 50%) and LLC "SZ ISK "Eurostroy", where Toros has a minor share – 5%, and Shikhidi holds the remaining 95%.

Where Sofia Toros, a former mid-level official, found the money to acquire these assets, history is silent. However, before working at the Treasury, in 2007, Sofia Toros was involved in a fraud investigation. Moreover, she appeared on blacklists of certain credit organizations. And open data, such as anti-corruption declarations, unequivocally suggest that the funds’ origins were illegal, presumably corruption-linked. Moreover, it is known from whom exactly Sofia Toros acquired these companies.

The former owners were all quite well-known persons. Among those who transferred shares in construction companies were, for example, relatives of Aleksandr Chistyakov - the former Deputy Chairman of the Board of FGC UES, co-owner of the oil company Ruspetro. Another source is the very well-known family in the Krasnodar region of Sergey Ozerov, a former deputy and mayor of Gelendzhik, and a State Duma deputy from "United Russia".

Toros and Shikhidi connected by a murderer

Sergey Ozerov has a long-standing partnership with Nikolai Shikhidi. And not only business-related but also criminal. For example, Shikhidi and Ozerov pooled resources and corrupt connections in law enforcement to tackle human rights defenders exposing their crimes.

One such episode involves the murder in the late 90s of a competitor of Ozerov. Members of the Gelendzhik Human Rights Center came into possession of a video recording in which serving the term performers of the murder of city deputy Vasily Karelin claim that this crime was ordered directly by Sergey Ozerov.

Karelin could have posed serious competition to Ozerov in the mayoral elections. On October 29, 1997, a hired killer Aleksey Bulygin shot at Karelin but missed. On December 26, Vasily Karelin was targeted again, this time fatally: a certain Maksim Bragin fired a burst of shots at the deputy.

Later, Bulygin and Bragin, together with the crime group’s organizer Vyacheslav Sazonov, were sentenced to long prison terms. During the investigation, they didn’t name the client, accepting full responsibility. Both had signs of torture. The trial was held in a confidential manner.

In the video (recorded in places of detention in 2004), Bulygin and Bragin name Sergey Ozerov as the client of the murder.

Bulygin: "The client is a well-known person in the city of Gelendzhik, Sergey Ozerov. There was a specific meeting with him. I, Bragin, and Sazonov met. Everything was discussed at a café. There was a specific conversation about the murder. There was a specific amount of 20 thousand dollars for everyone. Ozerov specifically gave the weapon. A Kalashnikov assault rifle of the old model."

At the end of the conversation, the convicts say that if necessary, they are ready to testify officially.

In 2006, the Gelendzhik Human Rights Center submitted this video to the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office. From there, the appeal was sent to the Krasnoyarsk Territory Prosecutor’s Office, where it was buried. A complaint about the prosecutor’s inaction was filed with the October District Court of Krasnodar, but the federal judge Chaban returned the complaint without review.

Remarkably, later Nikolai Shikhidi made a decisive contribution to the defeat of law enforcement by the Gelendzhik Human Rights Center. Shikhidi, along with other local corrupt developers, incriminated the human rights activists, and they were eventually "shut down". Nikolai Shikhidi claimed to have given the human rights activists 500 thousand rubles to enable the seamless and illegal construction of a seven-story building.

For allegedly bribing, he didn’t serve time. But the human rights defenders, who were a thorn in the side of local corrupt officials - both officials and developers - were accused of extortion and sentenced to long prison terms.

In conclusion, it is worth mentioning the ethical aspect of the criminal developers of South Russia. The very unscrupulousness of Shikhidi, Toros, Orlov, and their many accomplices, of course, surprises no one. That’s what swindlers are for, to not expect nobility from them. But in the case of Nikolai Shikhidi personally, his cynicism and immoral unscrupulousness look like bitter irony. The thing is that among his ancestors, there are those who suffered from Stalinist repressions, were deported to Kazakhstan in the 1940s solely for their Greek origin. The whole tragedy of the situation is that Nikolai Shikhidi, a descendant of illegally repressed Greeks, turned out to be a crook, a snitch, and a provocateur, due to whose slander innocent people ended up behind bars.

Ольга Балакина