Zvukov recording: Russia returned assets of the publishing house "Music" from a US citizen

The shares of JSC Muzyka Publishing House, Russia's largest repository of music publications, will be withdrawn to state revenue. This decision was made by the court at the request of the Prosecutor General's Office. The assets belonged to a US citizen, Mark Silberquit. According to the source of Izvestia, the claims of the supervisory authority related to the auction, as a result of which the company was in the possession of Silberquit — the tender had signs of fictitious, and the purchase price turned out to be only 8.4 million rubles. As a result, the State was forced to pay for access to the national cultural heritage. The details of the case are in the Izvestia article.

Why are assets being withdrawn?

The Perovsky Court of Moscow has satisfied the claim of the Prosecutor General's Office on the conversion of shares of JSC Publishing House Muzyka, the largest repository of music publications in Russia, into state revenue. The decision was made almost immediately — it was expected that on Thursday, September 18, there would be only the first substantive hearing, but the judge's verdict was not long in coming.

The prosecutor's office filed an anti-corruption lawsuit against the former CEO of the organization, a citizen of Russia and the United States, Mark Silberquit, in August 2025.

In March 2024, he was appointed Director of FSUE Muzyka Publishing House. However, according to Izvestia's sources, Silberquit, being a US citizen, "had intentions to deprive Russia of these cultural values and seize a state-owned enterprise."

Having assumed the position of director, Silberquit had to abandon entrepreneurial and other paid activities, and he also had no right to use official information for personal purposes. Current legislation prohibited him from heading state-owned enterprises and at the same time being the founder of commercial legal entities. This was contrary to the federal law of 2002 "On State and Municipal Unitary Enterprises".

In 2003, Silberquit founded Gamma Press LLC, and in 2004, P. Yurgenson Music Publishing LLC, which did not have any assets at the time of its creation. Further, according to the court's materials, he initiated the process of corporatization and subsequent privatization of the FSUE Muzyka Publishing House. The transfer of the unique fund into private hands was helped by assigning it a book value of zero.

The result of the scheme was an auction at which Gamma-Press Publishing House, LLC, affiliated with Silberquit, won and acquired shares of OAO Muzyka Publishing House for 8.4 million rubles.

Further, Silberquit, according to court materials, digitized printed copies, issued copyrights and restricted their free use in the country, prohibiting free access to them.

In addition to 82-year-old Mark Zilberkvit, the defendants in the case were his wife, 77-year-old Elena Zilberkvit, the daughter of his business partner Anastasia Yurgenson and Gamma-Press Publishing House LLC. JSC "Music Publishing House", as well as LLC "Music Publishing House " P. Jurgenson" were declared in the case as third parties.

—The Yurgenson Library was created by my great—great-grandfather," Anastasia Yurgenson said during the meeting, "And if there had been a revolution in our country, it would all belong to me. On completely legal grounds. On what legal grounds the Russian Federation wants to take away my share, I do not understand.

After the court ruling, she called it "fabricated."

What did the Prosecutor General's Office insist on?

The publishing house has become a monopolist in the Russian market over the past 100 years, the case file says. Because of this, educational institutions of a musical profile and performers of classical works have become dependent. The state is forced to sign contracts for the printing of musical literature, that is, to pay for access to cultural heritage sites.

At the same time, the set prices "force ordinary consumers and budget organizations to abandon such services and look for sources necessary for training on "gray" sites" on the Internet, sources told Izvestia.

The Prosecutor General's Office asked the court to convert 10.8 thousand pieces of ordinary registered shares of JSC Muzyka Publishing House, as well as 100% of shares in the authorized capital of Gamma-Press Publishing House LLC and Music Publishing House LLC to state income. Jurgenson." These assets have now been seized.

According to the position of the Prosecutor General's Office, the defendants' actions "are contrary to the principles of law and order and morality, since their main goal was to extract corrupt income and legalize it, conceal it from regulatory authorities and obtain illegal enrichment."

Are the defendants facing new cases

The lawsuit filed by the Prosecutor General's Office is an example of the state's active struggle against corruption and illegal enrichment, Vladimir Kuznetsov, chairman of the All—Russian Trade Union of Mediators, told Izvestia.

"The prosecutor's office refers to the fact that Silberquit's actions constitute an abuse of official authority and illegal use of official position in order to benefit himself and third parties," he said. — Such actions, according to the prosecutor's office, are an illegal act that encroaches on the foundations of the constitutional order.

The key point of the proceedings is the application of clause 8, clause 2, Article 235 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation: it provides for the possibility of compulsory seizure of property by the court if the owner has not provided evidence of its acquisition by lawful means. The Prosecutor's Office argued that property obtained through corruption could not be a legal object of civil turnover and was subject to State revenue.

"Transactions mediating such actions are contrary to the principles of law and order and morality," the lawyer added. — In its rulings, the Constitutional Court has repeatedly stressed the inadmissibility of corrupt enrichment and the absence of a statute of limitations for the prosecutor's claims. This means that even long after the alleged violations have been committed, the State has the right to demand the return of illegally obtained assets.

The case of the Muzyka publishing house is not just a case of corporate fraud, said Anastasia Shcherbakova, senior associate at the Mikhailov & Co. Law Agency. In fact, according to her, there has been a loss of a valuable cultural asset that hinders the development of musical culture in the country.

"This is a vivid example that shows how vulnerable the mechanism of privatization of state assets has turned out to be for local managers," she added. — The scheme turned out to be simple, even classic, with the help of which many former state-owned enterprises were privatized, and court cases are now being opened against them. The person who received the head's chair, who did not need approval from "above" to make decisions, transforms the FSUE into a joint-stock company.

Thus, the resulting shares were sold to a controlled organization, and the entire musical heritage — a valuable intangible asset of the country — was valued at zero rubles. Then these assets are appropriated, access to them is restricted as to someone else's intellectual property, Anastasia Shcherbakova described the standard scheme.

"And then state and not only cultural and educational institutions are forced to overpay for resources that are originally state property," she said.

Lilya Kattakulova, lawyer of the Bashkir Republican Bar Association, noted that Russia has already developed a practice of seizing property obtained in violation of the terms of acquisition. She cited the Solikamsk Magnesium Plant and the Bashkir Soda Company as examples.

For the defendants, according to Vladimir Kuznetsov, the court's decision will mean not only the loss of assets, but also serious reputational and possibly criminal consequences. According to him, the actions mentioned in the lawsuit of the Prosecutor General's Office may fall under articles of the Criminal Code related to fraud, abuse of authority or money laundering.