Defence lawyer may be banned from banker's murder case

18 Jan, 2007 06:20 / Updated 17 years ago

Russian prosecutors are reportedly intending to prevent the lawyer, Igor Trunov, from defending Aleksey Frenkel, who's been charged with organising the murder of a prominent banker last September.

The prosecutors say Mr Trunov broke the law by telling the media details of the charges which were regarded as a secret.Andrey Kozlov, who was the Deputy Chairman of Russia's Central Bank, was shot dead as he left a a Moscow sports stadium.Mr Frenkel denies all the charges against him and has revoked previous statements.Aleksey Frenkel is the former head of VIP bank whose license was revoked 3 months before Kozlov's murder.It's alleged that Mr Frenkel lost billions of dollars after the closure.Next week the Arbitration court will study the Central bank's petition on the bankruptcy of VIP bank.