THE SUPREME COURT RECALCULATED THE TERMS IN THE DISPUTE ON SUBSIDIARY LIABILITY

The Judicial Board for Economic Disputes recently had to consider a cassation appeal, which was addressed by the former head of the company "Angarit" Irina Voropaeva. In the insolvency case of the company (No. A19-5157/2017), one of the creditors (JSC "IESK") tried to bring the ex-director to subsidiary liability. However, the issue of calculating the statute of limitations greatly confused the situation in which the judges of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation had to deal with.

From December 25, 2014 to June 25, 2019, Irina Voropaeva managed the activities of the Angarit company. According to representatives of "IESK", the woman violated the obligation to file a claim for bankruptcy of the organization in time, provided for in article 9 of the relevant law.

However, the Irkutsk arbitration court, which considered IESK's application to involve Voropayeva in the subsidiary, refused to satisfy the claim. The court considered that the plaintiff missed the statute of limitations for filing an application. The requirements of IESK were included in the register in February 2018. The Court decided to consider this date as the beginning of the term. The application for a "subsidiary" was sent in 2020. The court decided that the one-year deadline was missed.

The appeal, whose verdict was delivered on April 21, 2022, did not agree with the decision of the arbitration of the Irkutsk region. After all, in February 2018, IESK could not yet know whether Voropayeva had violated the law. Moreover, the impossibility of paying off the entire debt was discovered after the auctions were held and the assets were sold off. As a result, the claim was satisfied. The decision of the appeal was later supported by the district court.

Now Voropayeva has filed a complaint with the Supreme Court. After all, the courts considered that the director should have declared bankruptcy no later than February 1, 2016. However, in reality, the organization assumed obligations to IESK as early as August 24, 2015, that is, long before the signs of bankruptcy appeared. Thus, it is wrong to consider Voropaeva a deceiver who did not provide the creditor with information about the insolvency of the company.

The Economic Board drew the attention of the courts to the fallacy of identifying the term of the obligation and the time of its execution. But with the statute of limitations, the Supreme Court agreed with the verdict of the appellate instance. It could not have started earlier than the creditor had the right to file a claim for subsidiary liability (in this case, the recognition of the company as bankrupt), the deadline could not exactly. As a result, the decisions of the courts were canceled, and the case was sent to the Irkutsk arbitration for a new review.

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