A top Russian judge described as “unusually independent-minded and incorruptible” involved in high-profile cases was killed in the Crimea bridge explosion, it has emerged.
In a dramatic new twist it appears a black Cadillac belonging to judge Sergey Maslov, 42, was next to a truck which - until now - has been seen as being at the epicentre of the explosion.
The judge, who had investigated family members of Putin’s cronies as well as energy company Gazprom, which has close links to the oligarch - died in Saturday’s blast on the £3.3 billion bridge, reports newspaper Moskovsky Komsomolets (MK).
The car plunged into the sea from a destroyed section of the crossing in Saturday’s blast - it was reported that tour guides and documentary makers Eduard Chuchakin, 53, and his wife Zoya Sofronova, 33, from St Petersburg had died in the car.
For unknown reasons, the name of the judge was not released at the same time as those two others in his car.
A fourth victim in the Cadillac was reported to be Gleb Orgetkin, 26, a fitness instructor.
Russia was quick to announce that the explosion was the result of a truck bomb, variously blaming Ukraine, Bulgaria and Britain.
The judge’s death - if confirmed - may alter the way the explosion is viewed.
The car was close to the truck when the explosion came.
Already there had been suggestions that the explosion may have been a Russian operation to justify a huge missile attack on Ukraine, which has now taken place to please Putin’s hardliner backers.
The dead couple “had long been acquainted with the judge of the Moscow Arbitration Court, 42-year-old Sergey Maslov,” reported MK.
“It was in his Cadillac that the group [including Orgetkin] went to the Crimea.”
Maslov had owned the car since 2017 and had told colleagues he was taking a vacation in annexed Crimea, where he owned land.
A legal source said he was “unusually independent-minded and incorruptible” who ruled on "sensitive cases" involving business disputes.
Cheka-OGPU Telegram channel said Maslov “was driving a huge and heavy Cadillac, which was at the epicentre of the explosion”.
The media outlet speculated that explosives may have been in the vehicle, rather than the truck.
The judge had “considered high-profile cases [involving] gigantic sums”, it said.
“The last case that fell into the judge's proceedings was where Ramzan Kadyrov's daughter acted as the defendant”.
Aishat Kadyrova, 23, is a fashion designer and one of his 14 children.
The case before Maslov and seemingly halted after publishing group Conde Nast “unexpectedly withdrew”.
One case before him was won by Gazprom in October 2020.
“The Cadillac Escalade is a huge and heavy car that could hold a lot of explosives, for example, amongst luggage,” stated the report without citing any evidence for its claim.
A picture of his vehicle has since emerged.
“To this we can add that the judge was an inviolable person and no-one would inspect his car.
“So the version that the target of the explosion, from which [nearby train tankers full of fuel] also exploded, could well have been Maslov, has the right to be considered.
“There is something to work with.”
Meanwhile Cheka-OGPU claimed that the Russian version - involving explosives crossing a number of international borders - “seems rather strange”.
Chuchakin and Sofronova were well known tour guides and documentary-makers in St Petersburg.
Their names emerged long before those of the judge and the other passenger.
The pair were history graduates of Putin’s alma mater St Petersburg State University.
He was a specialist in the tsarist architecture of St Petersburg and she had been a journalist.
They led tourist expeditions in the city on notorious holy monk Grigory Rasputin.
The driver of the truck Makhir Yusubov, 52, was also believed to have been killed in the blast.
Close Putin ally Alexander Bastrykin, head of the Russian Investigative Committee, said the red-coloured truck had been to NATO country Bulgaria as well as Georgia, Armenia, North Ossetia, the Russian region of Krasnodar ahead of the explosion.
Russia has seen a spate of mysterious deaths linked to energy companies including Gazprom since the war started.
On 1 September, oil tycoon Ravil Maganov, 67,fell to his death from the sixth floor window of a Moscow hospital.
One report says the chairman of Lukoil - Russia’s second largest oil company - was “beaten” before he was “thrown out of a window”, however this was not confirmed officially.
His company had voiced opposition to the war in Ukraine.
