Semyon Ovchinnikov

Education and research

Graduated from the Law Department of Saint Petersburg State University with a bachelor's degree in the program of higher professional education “Law” and a master's degree in the program “Civil Procedure, Arbitration Procedure”.

Semyon successfully completed such additional education programs as “Current problems of civil law” of the Law Department of Saint Petersburg State University and “English for lawyers. TOLES” School of Translation and Foreign Languages of Saint Petersburg State University.

Currently working on a thesis for the degree of Candidate of Legal Sciences under the guidance of Professor M.Z. Schwarts with the research topic “Admissibility of evidence in civil proceedings”.

He speaks English fluently.

Work experience and practice

Semyon Ovchinnikov is a specialist in environment, energy, land and bankruptcy laws.

For more than 8 years, he has been successfully providing legal assistance to clients and representing their interests in arbitration courts and courts of general jurisdiction. He has a wide experience in conducting complex economic cases involving damage to the water bodies and atmospheric air, cases in the field of water disposal and heat supply as well as experience in supporting large-scale bankruptcy procedures.

In addition to judicial representation, Semyon renders comprehensive legal support to the business activity of the clients, he prepares legal opinions on controversial issues about application of legislation in the area of clients’ business interests.

Semyon Ovchinnikov is personally recommended by “Pravo-300” ratings as environmental lawyer. He is the author of notices for business publications.

The key projects of Semyon Ovchinnikov are:

• successful support of more than 20 interrelated cases on challenging the acts of executive authorities (orders to eliminate violations and decisions on bringing to administrative responsibility) in the field of water use and protection of atmospheric air in relation to the client – one of the leading manufacturing companies in Russia and the world in the pulp and paper industry;
• preparation of a legal opinion on the prospects of challenging the order of executive authorities for one of the largest and oldest forestry companies in Russia (founded more than 70 years ago);
• successful defense of an organisation which manages a chain of shopping and entertainment centers in Saint Petersburg from administrative liability for violating environmental management rules, which allowed the client to retain a land plot worth more than 2 billion rubles;
• support of a number of interrelated court cases in the field of water disposal on issues of challenging the status of a guaranteeing organisation and potential damage to the objects of the centralized water disposal system owned by the client;
• preparation of a conclusion for a large domestic manufacturing company on the possibility of accounting for the costs of constructing treatment facilities in the amount of more than 5 billion rubles simultaneously both when receiving a deduction under an agreement on the protection and encouragement of capital investments and when offsetting amounts of compensation for damage caused to the environment;
• consulting a client constructing a gas treatment plant at the largest field in eastern Russia – the main source of gas for the Power of Siberia gas pipeline – on the admissibility of discharging wastewater into a water body without using a centralized drainage system;
• preparation of a comprehensive legal opinion on the protection of rights to linear objects and easements for Russian largest network of shopping and entertainment centers, which allowed the company not to lose annual revenue of 8 billion rubles;
• full support of bankruptcy procedures (from initiating a case to the exclusion of the debtor from the register) of the oldest Saint Petersburg dealer of Swedish cars, a large Russian retailer, a Saint Petersburg glass factory;
• successful restoration of solvency of a forestry enterprise (one of the main suppliers of timber for a major Russian pulp and paper company) in the external management procedure;
• effective protection of the head of the largest construction company in the North-West of Russia (contract portfolio of 25 billion rubles) from being held subsidiary liable under the company’s obligations amounting to 5 billion rubles;
• successful return of a real estate property worth of 20 million rubles to the bankruptcy estate, as a result of challenge on the basis of abuse of right (Articles 10 and 168 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation) a transaction which has completed outside the period of suspicion;
• preservation of the debtor-individual only residential premises worth of 50 million rubles by proving the absence of signs of “luxury” housing, despite judicial practice that has developed not in favour of the client;
• effective resistance to the inclusion of debt in amount of 81 million rubles based on imaginary transactions (with falsified documents) in the register of creditors' claims;
• successful subordination of the claims in the amount of 43 million rubles filed by a creditor belonging to the same group of people as the debtor;
• effective protection of debtor company’s beneficiary from the damages in the amount of 50 million rubles being recovered from him.