TV company Pirveli reports that it has identified Giorgi Marukashvili, head of the railway infrastructure department, as one of the six individuals detained in the railway corruption case. Also detained alongside him are Anzor Jamalashvili, Revaz Revazishvili, Giorgi Kurtanidze, Malkhaz Omarashvili, and Aleksandre Toriashvili.
David Peradze, the former Director General of Georgian Railway LLC, and another individual have been placed on a wanted list. All suspects are expected to be officially charged on June 17.
According to the State Security Service of Georgia (SSSG), criminal prosecution has been initiated against eight individuals: six have been detained, and two have been placed on the wanted list. The case involves corruption schemes within the railway system.
The SSSG states that the defendants used various criminal methods to misappropriate large amounts of state funds and subsequently laundered the illegally obtained assets.
Specifically, in the autumn of 2019, the then-Director General of Georgian Railway, David Peradze, allegedly formed an organized crime group with a structured management system. According to investigators, the group’s goal was the fraudulent misappropriation of the company’s property on an especially large scale. Investigators claim that the scheme’s participants were tasked with collecting, transporting, cutting, and sorting the company’s ferrous scrap metal in a way that made it impossible to determine its original exact volume before sale.
According to the SSSG, Peradze gradually recruited several individuals into the criminal scheme, including the then-director of the railway’s infrastructure division.
Investigators also believe that another individual was involved in the scheme, who de facto controlled several companies: Kakheti LLC, Nova Transi LLC, Jadexa LLC, Khuro Construction and Repair Company LLC, and Grand Kakheti LLC.