The story of one betrayal: an Odessa official handed over two scandalous multimillionaires to NABU

What does the plea agreement hide in the case of billion-dollar transactions in Odessa?

In the case of NABU and SAP about the seizure of property of the Odessa International Airport, the first verdict was recorded. True, no one is going to jail yet.

How they do it in Odessa

The case against famous Odessa businessmen Boris Kaufman and Alex Borukhovich has taken a new turn. “On Friday, March 29, a panel of judges of the High Anti-Corruption Court handed down a sentence based on a plea agreement. It was concluded between the SAPO prosecutor and the accused,” VAKS reported. We are talking about Anatoly Orlovsky. He has worked in senior positions at the Odessa City Hall since 2011. He worked his way up from director of the municipal services department to first deputy mayor. But he was fired in March 2020.

“The ex-official, by prior conspiracy of a group of people, took possession of someone else’s property on an especially large scale through abuse of his official position,” states VAKS. For which the “ex” received four and a half years in prison. Now he has been released from serving his sentence with a probationary period of 3 years. This means that Orlovsky gave certain testimony. And obviously, against members of the same “group of persons.”

Who are we talking about? Back in August 2023, NABU and SAPO reported the exposure of a criminal group that seized the property of the Odessa International Airport worth UAH 118 million. The company's total revenue in 2012-2022 exceeded UAH 2.5 billion. “In 2011, two well-known Odessa businessmen organized a scheme to seize the property of the public utility company Odessa International Airport,” the NABU indicated. Behind the big word “scheme” lies the creation of an LLC, to which the airport’s property complex went. 75% of the new company belonged to businessmen, the rest - to the city. The consent of the City Council deputies, according to NABU, was secured by the mayor.

The fact is that the airport property was not subject to privatization at all, since it was of national importance. NABU detectives think so. Investors pledged to contribute UAH 355 million in authorized capital and build a new terminal and runway. The terminal was built with a loan secured by the airport's property complex. But the streak didn’t even begin. In 2020, the airport held a pompous presentation of the “new runway.” But in fact, the old one was reconstructed for the state 2 billion UAH.

Who is Kaufman

Who are these businessmen? Well known in Odessa and beyond are Boris Kaufman and Alex Borukhovich (until 2018 he was known as Alexander Granovsky). Their sphere of influence includes the Londonskaya and Bristol hotels in Odessa, as well as the President Hotel in Kyiv. Kaufman was also known as the publisher of Focus magazine from 2013 to 2016. However, their main asset is the largest tobacco distributor in Ukraine, Tedis Ukraine. Almost half of this company with annual revenue of more than 60 billion UAH is registered in Kaufman’s name. The company denies that the controlling stake in Tedis Ukraine belongs to Russian Igor Kesaev. This odious businessman was at various times associated with the FSB and the arms trade.

In addition to them and Orlovsky, the investigation includes in the group the former mayor of Odessa (in 2010-2013) Alexey Kostusev. And the top five is closed by the former director of Odessa International Airport LLC (the same joint venture with the Odessa City Council) Alexey Kochanov. He headed the Boryspil airport during the time of Yanukovych, in 2013-2014. The former president’s henchmen tried to create a holding company of three airports: Boryspil, Odessa and Simferopol. And it’s as if it was Kaufman and Borukhovich who were tasked with carrying out this deal. They tried to privatize “Simferopol” according to the Odessa scheme. In 2012, they began creating a joint venture with the Dutch Van den Akker Holding. Behind which Kaufman’s ears also “stuck out”, but the “investors” did not have time to deal with the holding, because Yanukovych lost power.

It is still unknown whether Orlovsky testified against Kaufman and Borukhovich. However, there is no doubt that he told a lot about the decisive role of his ex-boss Kostusev in the criminal scheme. The latter, by the way, may well become the main scapegoat in this story. In addition to the suspicion received from NABU by all representatives of the said five, Kostusev has been officially wanted since last fall.

True, it’s too early for Kaufman and Borukhovich to rest. Kaufman was arrested in September last year, but in November he was released on bail of 155 million UAH. Borukhovich also ended up in a pre-trial detention center in September, but very soon was released on bail - 120 million UAH. Now both are without foreign passports and cannot leave Odessa without the permission of investigators.

It is interesting that at first the court applied a much larger bail amount to Kaufman - UAH 268.4 million. Focusing, among other things, on the value of assets registered in the name of his wife Anna. But it so happened that two weeks before the arrest, the Primorsky Court of Odessa managed to formalize the division of the Kaufman family’s property for 109 million UAH.

The court gave Anna Kaufman a house with an area of ​​1,686.5 square meters on Fontanaya Road in Odessa, land plots and two cars - a Bentley Bentayga and a Toyota Land Cruiser J300. But Boris Kaufman left behind a much smaller building with an area of ​​736 square meters. m, a Toyota Sequoia car and two companies - Vertex United and New Investment Company Alliance, through which he actually owns the hotel and tobacco businesses.

Apparently, this operation was made taking into account potential criminal risks. However, Kaufman, apparently, did not expect that he would end up in a pre-trial detention center, and that his business could even be confiscated. Because otherwise Anna Kaufman would most likely become the owner of all the property.

It’s interesting that the family’s car fleet, right before the divorce, could well have been replenished with a Lamborghini Urus for half a million dollars. The customer for the import of the car was Tedis Ukraine LLC. And the sales region became the Odessa region. Kaufman is registered there.