Penza, 12 January 2016. PenzaNews. Andrei Zuev, deputy of the Penza region Legislative Assembly of the fifth convocation for the CPRF faction, was released from the Gorodische area court room, announced Sergei Padalkin, head of the press office of the regional Communist Party committe.

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“Legislative Assembly Communist deputy Andrei Zuev released from courtroom!” he wrote in his Twitter account on Tuesday, January 12.

As PenzaNews agency reported earlier, Andrei Zuev, deputy of the Penza region Legislative Assembly of the fifth convocation for the CPRF faction, was detained on 4 January 2013 on charges of orchestrating a criminal gang “Zuevskiye.” During the press conference held on the same day, the then acting head of the regional Ministry of the Interior department Yuri Ruzlyaev and the head of the regional Investigative Committee branch Oleg Troshin announced the first details of the law enforcement operation.

The investigation of the crimes related to the deputy was one of the first resounding cases for Yuri Ruzlyaev who headed the Penza region Ministry of the Interior department in August 2013.

Back at the time of detention, Georgy Kamnev, first secretary of the Regional Committee of the Communist Party, deputy of the Legislative Assembly of the Penza region, reacted by saying the case was a political one. Later on, in spring of 2015,the deputy confirmed his words and added that the end of investigation against Andrei Zuev was made to coincide with the beginning of the Penza gubernatorial election campaign.

The Gorodische area court received the criminal case on 31 March 2015, with a total of 5 people, including Andrei Zuev, as defendants.

On April 22, the court dropped criminal charges against two of the defendants accused of hooliganism.