On December 28, the Baku Court of Serious Crimes sentenced Rasim Mammadov, the former head of the Baku Steel Company, to 14 years in prison with confiscation of his property. According to the court's verdict, Mammadov will serve his sentence in a strict-regime penitentiary.

Rasim Mammadov asked for an acquittal, saying that he had nothing to do with the charges filed in court. On November 21, State Prosecutor Orkhan Samadov asked the court to find Mammadov guilty of all charges and to sentence him to 15 years imprisonment with confiscation of his property. 179.4 of the Mammadov Criminal Code (embezzlement of property in large amounts); 193.3.2 (false entrepreneurship, especially when it results in a large amount of income); 308.2 (abuse of official powers, when it results in severe consequences); and 313 He is accused of committing the economic crimes specified in articles (falsification of duty).

Earlier, according to the information released by the State Security Service on February 3, Rasim Mammadov, the chairman of the Supervisory Board of Baku Steel Company LLC, was detained. According to the report, Rasim Mammadov deliberately used his powers contrary to the interests of the service and embezzled EUR 7.2 million from the funds transferred to the enterprise through formalized sales and wasted EUR 23.1 million worth of manufactured goods. With these actions, it was determined that "Baku Steel Company" LLC caused significant damage to its financial resources and continuous activity. It seized a large amount of money from various people by deception and abuse of trust and committed repeated fraudulent acts.

Importantly, Baku Steel Company, led by Rasim Mammadov, was the country's first large steelmaking enterprise, which started its operation in 2001. The company's annual production capacity for steel production was one million tons.

In the last few years, articles have been published in the local media about this company's monopolistic position, taking over the property of other companies and using its position of closeness to several high-ranking officials to gain an advantage in the market.