Yesterday we reported on the return of former Deputy Finance Minister Sergei Storchak, whose unlawful pre-trial imprisonment on fraud charges is a focal point of the Kremlin clan wars between the liberal St. Petersburg economists and the hard-line siloviki. Today we offer an exclusive English translation of the letter published by Gazeta from Storchak, defending his innocence and pleading for his release. “The charges themselves serve as evidence of the crime” Sergey Storchak has written a letter to a “Gazeta” correspondent For eight months deputy minister of finance of Russia Sergey Storchak, charged with attempting to steal $43.3 mln from the budget, is found in detention. At first – in the “Lefortovo” isolator. Now – in “Matrosskaya Tishina”. It is from there that he wrote a letter to “Gazeta” special correspondent Maria Rogacheva, on the 10 pages of which he attempted to analyze the causes and effects of his criminal case, as well as telling about how he spends time in confinement and what he plans to be doing after release. Storchak writes that until now, he has not found an answer to the most main question for him: who is standing behind the criminal prosecution?