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Lawyer Confesses to $17M Robbery Hoax

A lawyer arrested for allegedly stealing $17 million in cash has confessed and disclosed the location of the money, RIA-Novosti reported Thursday.

Yevgeny Skoblikov, 33, was arrested in October soon after he told police that about $6 million and 7 million euros ($10.5 million) in cash were stolen from his rented Moscow apartment. He said the money, stored in several suitcases, belonged to his clients from Novosibirsk, who had received it as inheritance.

The investigators believe that he faked the robbery and hid the cash.

Skoblikov disclosed the information after several months in custody during a lie-detector test, the report said.

"The missing sum was discovered in the place that he mentioned," a law enforcement source told RIA-Novosti.

The cash was found hidden in the Moscow region town of Lobnya packed in three big bags weighing 70 kilograms in total, Moscow police spokesman Viktor Biryukov told Gazeta.ru.

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