A court in Yekaterinburg has sentenced Denis Allayarov, a former editor at the news agency Ura.ru, to five years in prison on a bribery charge, the independent Russian news outlet Mediazona reported.
The court also fined Allayarov 1.2 million rubles and banned him from working as a journalist for four years after his release. Prosecutors had asked for the sentence he received.
Allayarov was charged with bribing his uncle, Andrey Karpov, who headed the criminal investigations unit of Yekaterinburg’s Police Precinct No. 10. Investigators said Allayarov received several operational police reports from Karpov and paid him a total of 120,000 rubles in exchange.
Allayarov initially denied guilt, saying the money was intended to buy medicine for his grandmother. At a court hearing on April 1, 2026, he admitted guilt. He said he had been helping his uncle financially because Karpov was in financial difficulty, and said that Karpov had himself proposed the arrangement — offering the reports for payment and setting the price.
Karpov had previously also admitted guilt, testified against Allayarov, and received a four-year suspended sentence on charges of accepting a bribe and abuse of authority.
Denis Allayarov was detained in June 2025. Investigators also visited the Ura.ru newsroom in Yekaterinburg and searched the homes of 3 employees. After his detention, Ura.ru said Allayarov had been framed by his uncle and called the searches a “provocation.” In November 2025, the news agency came under the ownership of Readovka, a pro-war Russian Telegram channel.
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