MOSCOW, December 12 (RAPSI) – The former deputy chief of the Federal Penitentiary Service’s Rostov Region Main Directorate (FSIN) Sergey Ralnikov has been sentenced to 3.5 years in high-security prison for taking bribes, according to the press service of Russia’s Investigative Committee.

Ralnikov has been found guilty of receiving bribes on a large scale by a group of people in conspiracy.

According to investigators, between July 2016 and May 2017 Ralnikov conspired with Sergey Smirnov, the chief of the Federal Penitentiary Service’s Rostov Region Main Directorate to receive over 11 million rubles in bribes from several commercial organizations.

Moreover, from January 2016 to May 2017, the two men along with the chief of the logistics support office of the Rostov Region’s FSIN directorate Alexander Asyutin took 450,000 rubles, a part of the expected bribe, from a representative of another commercial organization, the statement reads.