The Procurator (Russian: прокурор, tr. prokuror) was an office initially established in 1722 by Peter the Great, the first Emperor of the Russian Empire, as part of the ecclesiastical reforms to bring the Russian Orthodox Church more directly under his control.
The Russian word also has the meaning of prosecutor but in this case the right translation is Delegate (having the procuration for religious affairs).
The Chief Procurator (also Over-Procurator; обер-прокурор, tr. ober-prokuror) was the official title of the Crown official who oversaw the validity of the acts of the Most Holy Synod (he wasn't a member of the Most Holy Synod but effectively he was the most important lay in the administration of the Russian Orthodox Church, not to be confused with the Primus or "Prime member", the legal chairman of the Most Holy Synod, always a Metropolitan or an Archbishop), and a member of the Tsar's cabinet. Konstantin Pobedonostsev, a former tutor both of Alexander III and of Nicholas II, was one of the most powerful men to hold the post, from 1880 to 1905.
The General Procurator (Procurator General) and the Chief Procurator were major supervisory positions in the Russian Governing Senate, which functioned from 1711 to 1917, with their meaning changing over time. Eventually Chief Procurator became the title of the head of a department of the Senate.
List of Most Holy Synod Ober-Procurators
1722–1725 Ivan Boltin
1725–1730 Aleksei Baskakov
1730–1740 no appointments
1740–1741 Nikita Krechetnikov
1741–1753 Yakov Shakhovskoy
1753–1758 Afanasiy Lvov
1758–1763 Aleksei Kozlovskiy
1763–1768 Ivan Melissino
1768–1774 Pyotr Chebyshyov
1774–1786 Sergei Akchurin
1786–1791 Apollos Naumov
1791–1797 Count Aleksei Musin-Pushkin
1797–1799 Prince Vasiliy Khovanskiy
1799–1802 Count Dmitry Khvostov
1802–1803 Aleksandr Yakovlev
1803–1817 Prince Aleksandr Golitsyn
1817-1833 Prince Pyotr Meshcherskiy
1833–1836 Stepan Nechayev
1836–1855 Count Nikolay Protasov
1855–1856 Aleksandr Karasevskiy
1856–1862 Count Aleksandr Tolstoy
1862–1865 Aleksei Akhmatov
1865–1880 Count Dmitry Tolstoy
1880–1905 Konstantin Pobedonostsev
1905–1906 Prince Aleksei Obolenskiy
1906–1906 Prince Aleksei Shirinskiy-Shikhmatov
1906–1909 Pyotr Izvolskiy
1909–1911 Sergei Lukianov
1911–1915 Vladimir Sabler
1915–1915 Aleksandr Samarin
1915–1916 Alexander Volzhin
1916–1917 Nikolai Raev
1917–1917 Vladimir Lvov
1917–1917 Anton Kartashev