A criminal probe against Golubev, opened Wednesday, followed charges against his boss, Vladivostok Mayor Vladimir Nikolayev, accused of abuse of office and misappropriation of at least $250,000.
Prosecutors said Golubev had ordered on behalf of the Vladivostok administration to transfer 20 million rubles ($765,000) to a company for sporting arrangements, which had not been planned in the budget.
Mayor Nikolayev was suspended from office February 28 after investigators said he had personally signed a contract to hire armed bodyguards in September 2004 without being authorized to do so. He also illegally signed a contract for similar services to protect the city administration property in September 2005, prosecutors said.
According to them, both contracts, totaling 4.4 million rubles ($168,000), were funded from the city budget.
Nikolayev, who did not appear in court, is also suspected of illicitly using traffic police escort services, which cost the budget 600,000 rubles ($23,000) in 2006 alone. According to investigators, Nikolayev's spending on his personal body guard amounted to almost one million rubles ($38,000) last year.
It has also been established that 950,000 rubles ($36,000) was spent on a charter flight to take Nikolayev, his family and his two deputies with their wives to Seoul on a New Year vacation.
The inquiries are part of an anti-corruption campaign in Russia declared by President Vladimir Putin in July. The crackdown has resulted in about 600 bribery and embezzlement cases, which have been opened since then.
