MOSCOW (Reuters) – A Russian court will on July 28 start the trial of airport staff charged in the death of Christophe Margerie, the head of French oil major Total who was killed when his jet collided with a snow plough in a Moscow airport, Russian media reported on Friday.
Lawyers for the five airport employees who are defendants in the case asked the court on Thursday to send the case back to prosecutors, saying the investigation had missed crucial evidence. But the judge rejected those requests.
De Margerie was killed in October 2014 along with three air crew when his jet hit the snow plough as it was taking off from Moscow’s Vnukovo airport in the middle of the night.
The trial has been postponed several times and Russia’s IAC civil aviation investigative body has yet to release its report about the crash, which critics say exposed the country’s patchy air safety record.
(Reporting by Dmitry Solovyov; Editing by Christian Lowe)