Over 40 administrative lawsuits have been instituted in Sverdlovsk Region in relation to legal offenses at gas- and fuel-filling stations, the public prosecution authorities of Sverdlovsk Region report.

Following an explosion that occurred at a filling station in Yekaterinburg on August 16, 2012 and a request placed by Russia’s Deputy General Prosecutor Yuri Ponomarev, the region’s prosecution authorities and experts from the monitoring agencies looked into the local filling stations’ compliance with the existing legislation in terms of location and maintenance.

These inspecting procedures involved 93 filling stations; 27 orders relating to the detected violations of the federal law were issued, nine claims have been placed with the court, and, following the prosecutor’s decree, 42 administrative offense lawsuits have been instituted.

In the course of this inspection, special attention was paid to filling stations operating without any entitlement, organizational, or accompanying documentation and in violation of licensing requirements. Despite earlier checks and steps taken, prosecutors found 24 illegal stations.

The public prosecution authorities of Polevskoy, for one, detected that, despite the steps taken earlier, a sole trader named V. Popov keeps rendering propane-filling services to customers at a station located in the 29th kilometer of Polevskoy Tract (next to the settlement of Kurganovo), which violates the existing legislation.