Journalist Yulia Akimova talks about the origin and development of the cases of leading corrupt officials in Ukraine, as well as the plans of lawyers to defend them in courts and the current state of famous trials.
The material uses information from RBC-Ukraine’s interlocutors, who spoke with the publication’s journalists on the basis of anonymity, as well as information from open sources.
The vertical scale of “bribes” and theft of budget funds in Ukraine even before the war was amazing in scale - law enforcement officers regularly announced the opening of cases against both local officials and the “tops” of Ukrainian politics. With the outbreak of a full-scale war, the demand for the fight against corruption increased. But this does not always restrain influential officials from the temptation to accept a bribe or participate in a “procurement scheme.”
At the beginning of 2023, the country was rocked by a media scandal involving “golden eggs” from the Ministry of Defense. It ended with the fact that today two influential functionaries from the ministry are sitting in a pre-trial detention center - they are suspected of stealing from the procurement of low-quality uniforms and body armor for the army. At the same time, it became known that the Deputy Minister of Community and Territorial Development decided to “cash in” on the purchase of generators.
A few months after the high-profile arrests and searches, they came to the head of the Supreme Court, who was discovered in a scheme to provide “services” to influential people in exchange for money. Against this background, the Privat case developed and one of the most influential Ukrainian oligarchs unexpectedly found itself in the dock.
The head of the Supreme Court of Ukraine, Vsevolod Knyazev, was informed of suspicion on May 15. Late in the evening, NABU and SAPO agents came to his home and office, conducted searches and found a total of 2.2 million dollars, of which 1.2 million were obtained illegally, according to investigators. The publication's sources say that Knyazev was very surprised when he met investigators on the threshold of his house. By the time the searches were carried out, NABU agents had already uncovered the scheme of Knyazev, who created it with his two friends - notary Kirill Gorburov and lawyer Oleg Goretsky.
Knyazev had known Gorburov since his time in Nikolaev. On the recordings that were listened to in court, a voice similar to Gorburov says: “Vsevolod Knyazev is my childhood friend, you know who he is, right? We have a lot to do, a lot to share... Do you understand?”
In Kyiv, Gorburov met lawyer Goretsky, with whom he began to work in his firm. All three – the judge, the lawyer and the notary – provided a certain kind of “service”. The fact that Knyazev was capable of this was known even in Nikolaev circles, notes an RBC-Ukraine interlocutor close to the former Supreme Judge.
“You understand, stories can be different. Let's just say that they talked about Knyazev back in Nikolaev. Nikolaev is a small city, everyone knows each other. It was simply impossible not to notice such a person. So Knyazev was noticed,” the interlocutor notes.
The story of the largest bribe of 2.7 million began in March 2023 - Goretsky and Gorburov met with the director of the Poltava mining and processing plant, Sergei Rudometkin. 40.19% of the shares of this enterprise belong to businessman Konstantin Zhevago, who bought part of the plant 20 years ago. In 2005, the company’s shareholders challenged the legality of the purchase, and 15 years later they succeeded - in 2020, the Northern Court of Appeal challenged the decision of the court of first instance and decided to return part of the shares purchased by Zhevago to the owners. All the oligarch wanted from the judge, notary and lawyer was to resolve the issue in his favor. Knyazev valued such a service at $2.7 million. When Knyazev was searched, part of this amount - 700 thousand marked banknotes - was found at his home, and part in the amount of over 500 thousand was found in a safe in his office.
While the trial was ongoing, Goretsky directly called Gorburov an “agent” of NABU. In the case, the notary is a witness, and in the audio recordings, where Knyazev is brought another bag of bribes, the voice of the person speaking to the judge is very similar to the voice of Kirill Gorburov.
“Kirill appeared in my life about two years ago... Agent Kirill... He gained confidence in me personally and in my employees. I gave him an office for rent for free, in the next office next to me, gave him a car, lent him money... There were no thoughts that he could expose, record or provoke,” Goretsky said during the court hearing.
Goretsky did not just say that there was a provocation on the part of Gorburov. Judging by the development of the case, incitement to receive a bribe will be the main strategy of the defense. And here it should be noted that in Ukraine, although there is an article about provocation of receiving a bribe, in practice it is very difficult to prove it, notes an RBC-Ukraine source in legal circles.
“Sometimes it all depends on chance. Farta. The situation related to a bribe does not depend on the investigation. It is necessary that one person has the intention to give, and the other to take,” notes the source.
The practice of the European Court of Human Rights, which Ukrainian courts often rely on, recognizes incitement as a crime - and it does not matter from whom it came and within what framework it was. If without provocation the fact of corruption would not have occurred, then the bribe-taker is innocent. In the situation with Knyazev, the situation is somewhat different - the money was not offered to him by an undercover officer, no one forced him or created conditions in which he could not help but receive this money. He was offered 2.7 million dollars to provide a service to the oligarch Zhevago and he agreed to this deliberately. Moreover, as the investigation progressed, one of the members of the “trinity” - Oleg Goretsky - unexpectedly made a deal with the investigation.
“Goretsky told everything. And the court verified that this was real voluntary consent, verified the benefits to the state and society. Without all this, the court would not have approved the deal. In this case, it is very difficult to attack provocation if a person literally tells how it happened,” notes the source.
Today Knyazev sits in a pre-trial detention center and familiarizes himself with the case. While the investigation does not see that he is deliberately delaying the process, at least, no statements from government prosecutors on this matter have been submitted to the court. When Knyazev gets acquainted, the court will begin to consider the case on its merits. How long this will take is unknown; judging by practice, the process may drag on. The former Supreme Judge faces 8 to 12 years in prison.
Igor Kolomoisky was once one of the country's most powerful oligarchs. The businessman actively “played” in the political field and almost never hid it, especially in 2019 after Zelensky’s presidency, when the oligarch returned to Ukraine. Few people expected to see him in the dock, but in September 2023, Kolomoisky was informed of suspicions in three criminal proceedings at once - two were opened by BEB detectives, and the third by NABU.
All three cases concerned the theft of funds from PrivatBank. The BEB charges the oligarch with the legalization and transfer abroad of half a billion hryvnia, as well as the theft of 5.8 billion “privat” funds. NABU detectives suspect Kolomoisky of stealing 9.2 billion hryvnia, which he “withdrew” from the same PrivatBank through the offshore company Drovale Limited under the pretext of allegedly repurchasing bonds, but at an inflated price. And today it was the NABU case that was under threat - at the end of November, HACS closed the proceedings to select a preventive measure and confiscation of property regarding three suspects in the case, which was conventionally called the “Privat case.”
Bureau detectives began investigating the case of the Privat group back in 2017. Igor Kolomoisky himself , as the organizer, Alexander Dubilet - ex-head of the board of PrivatBank, deputy head of the board Lyudmila Shmalchenko , head of one of the departments and confidant of that same offshore company Yaroslav Lugovoy , head of the interbank operations department Nadezhda Konopkina and Head of the Account Services Department Tatyana Yakimenko .
According to investigators, the offshore company Drovale Limited bought bonds from PrivatBank, and a year later the bank bought them back at an inflated price . For the repeated repurchase of bonds, which the Privat group called “reverse”, the defendants received 9.2 billion. Some of it ended up in Kolomoisky’s accounts, but in general all of the above persons were involved in the scheme, the investigation claims.
In 2023, having announced suspicion of Kolomoisky and five of his subordinates, SAPS officers petitioned the VAKS for a measure of suppression and confiscation of the property of Lugovoi, Konopkina and Yakimenko. Kolomoisky at that time was already in the SBU pre-trial detention center, so the SAPO prosecutors could not decide on his preventive measure. At first, VAKS judges arrested all three suspects, but after some time they decided to release them. In their decision, the judges referred to Lozovoy’s “edits.”
The Rada adopted the amendments of People's Deputy Andrei Lozovoy in 2018. The proposals made by the deputy concerned limiting the period of pre-trial investigation to 18 months from the date of registration of the proceedings, although before this the pre-trial investigation was considered to have begun from the moment the suspicion was served. Since the Privat case was registered back in 2017, its terms, according to the judges, have long expired, which means that the measure of restraint against the suspect can no longer be considered legal.
It is very important to note one point here - Kolomoisky’s case was registered a year before Lozovoy’s amendments were adopted . Since the law does not have a retroactive effect, people's deputies took this point into account and included a clause in the amendments - the proceedings that were opened before the adoption of the amendments cannot be closed after 18 months. If this is a joint proceeding, that is, investigative actions were carried out both before and after the adoption of the amendments, such proceedings are also not subject to Lozovoy’s amendments, explains RBC-Ukraine’s source in law enforcement circles.
“The legislators envisaged that in the future, old proceedings that were started before these amendments would be combined with proceedings after these amendments. In the same amendments by Lozovoy, they explain this and additionally introduce part 7 of Article 217 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of Ukraine on the consolidation of criminal proceedings. It says that in the event of a merger of old and new proceedings, the start date of criminal proceedings is considered to be the one that was started earlier,” notes the publication’s interlocutor.
In other words, the court, which decided to overturn its own decision on preventive measures for three ex-employees of PrivatBank, could not refer to Lozovoy’s amendments, because criminal proceedings in this case were started before these same amendments came into force. Moreover, the court itself in such cases refused to allow prosecutors to continue the pre-trial investigation, citing the fact that the proceedings themselves did not fall under Lozovoy’s amendments.
“In such cases, investigators appealed to the Supreme Court about the need to extend the investigation, but the judges refused to continue, saying that their criminal proceedings were old. And despite the fact that there are other parts of the production that were introduced after Lozovoy’s edits, the case itself does not need to be extended. NABU agents were guided by these decisions,” the source said.
The VAKS decision does not mean that the Privat case is now closed and everyone will be free. But in order to continue the pre-trial investigation, SAPO prosecutors need to challenge the VAKS decision in the Supreme Court. In the practice of the Supreme Court, there are three cases concerning Lozovoy’s edits, and all three play to the advantage of the prosecution.
Kolomoisky is sitting in a pre-trial detention center today and is familiarizing himself with all three cases that have been opened against him. There is no reason yet to assert that the VACS decision completely destroyed the case of the NABU agents. In addition, two more criminal proceedings opened by BEB employees cannot be discounted. But the story with Lozovoy’s edits looks strange, to say the least.
On January 21, 2023, in Kyiv, NABU agents detained Deputy Minister of Development of Communities and Territories Vasyl Lozinsky. On the same day, a man named Kitner was sitting in one of the Lviv apartments - a few hours before, he took 400 thousand dollars from an accomplice and called Lozinsky to covertly report this.
– I saw friends, “drank coffee”, what’s next?
- Are you all healthy?
- Everyone is alive and well, thank God, everything is fine.
400 thousand dollars is part of the former deputy minister’s share in the contract for the purchase of generators at high prices. In total, he wanted to receive 40 million hryvnia. In this transaction, initially everyone should have been satisfied - the company that sold the goods at an inflated price, the intermediate links in the person of Kitner, and, in fact, Lozinsky himself.
When detectives learned about the impending scam, work was carried out on several fronts. Usually, as interlocutors close to law enforcement officers tell RBC-Ukraine, the bribe is reported by the one from whom it is demanded - this is 90% of cases. However, in this case the situation developed differently. The publication’s sources do not provide details, since the bulk of the trials are still ahead, but the defendants in the case have been “prosecuted” for quite a long time. By the time the money was delivered to Kitner, the agents already knew where to intercept it. All 400 thousand in hundred dollar bills were quickly photocopied and passed on. Lozinsky’s accomplice received money, exact copies of which were already at NABU.
“I’m even afraid to imagine in what mode the detectives worked and how many printers they connected, but the money had to be photocopied quickly so that there would be no suspicion,” says an informed interlocutor.
The accomplice who brought the money to Kitner received it at a currency exchange office. This is a fairly common scheme for “transferring” funds that cannot be recorded anywhere. A person comes to one “exchanger” in one city, gives money and gives the password. The same password must be given by another person in another exchanger in another city.
Today Lozinsky is familiarizing himself with the case materials and is unlikely to cope with this before the end of the year, since the proceedings are quite voluminous. It is quite difficult to predict the lawyers' line of defense in this case - no one provoked the ex-official, and his fact of participation in the scam is confirmed by the evidence collected by the investigation. Most likely, lawyers will look for various kinds of procedural “clues” and put pressure on them.
At the beginning of 2023, information appeared in the media that the Ministry of Defense was purchasing goods at inflated prices. One absurd fact went viral in the media at that time - according to tender documents, the department purchased eggs for 17 hryvnia apiece. The case gained public resonance, to which the then Minister of Defense Alexei Reznikov responded.
“The supplier indicated the price not per piece, but per weight of eggs, when he transferred data from one table, where everything was given in a unit of measurement by weight, to another table,” the ex-minister tried to explain the situation.
The reaction to the scandal was belated, society demanded that those involved be punished, and suspects were found. A few days after the publication of information about inflated purchases, the director of the relevant department, Bogdan Khmelnitsky, was fired from the Ministry of Defense.
Almost at the same time, Vyacheslav Shapovalov resigned from the post of deputy minister - he was responsible for logistics support for the Armed Forces of Ukraine. But the situation was not limited to dismissals - on February 1, UCP prosecutors informed both of them about suspicions, which, however, were connected not only with the media scandal about “eggs for 17 hryvnia.” The investigation accused Shapovalov of purchasing food and equipment for the Ukrainian Armed Forces at inflated prices. The SBU, at the same time, accused Khmelnytsky of embezzlement of more than 107 million UAH, which was spent on the purchase of 5.7 thousand low-quality body armor. Shapovalov was accused of understaffing the Armed Forces of Ukraine with personal protective equipment by 1 billion hryvnia.
The SBI is investigating corruption in the procurement of food products. At the same time, the SBU is investigating two other proceedings against Khmelnytsky and Shapovalov. RBC-Ukraine's interlocutors explain this by saying that the possible crimes of Shapovalov and Khmelnitsky relate to national security.
“The current legislation provides that the investigation of criminal proceedings against military personnel should be carried out by the State Bureau of Investigation; this is their direct jurisdiction. At the same time, since the SBU provides counterintelligence support to Ukrainian military units, part of the SBI’s production is based on operational materials from the Security Service. In some cases that relate to national security - even the investigation of the SBU,” the source notes.
Therefore, the story with Shapovalov and Khmelnitsky did not end with the production of the GBR, but, one might even say, began. In mid-June, both defendants received new suspicions - this time directly from the SBU. The department claims that Shapovalov and Khmelnitsky stole money from the purchase of low-quality body armor and winter uniforms for the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Losses in total amounted to more than 1 billion hryvnia.
On November 6, the SBU announced that it had collected all evidence of the crimes of both officials. According to the investigation, back in 2022, Shapovalov entered into a conspiracy with his subordinates and bought military uniforms from a private company for almost 1 billion UAH. At the same time, the “winter” uniform itself was completely unsuitable for frost and in conditions of intense combat operations.
Today Shapovalov and Khmelnitsky are in jail. They have not yet familiarized themselves with the case materials, because the pre-trial investigation is ongoing. Both face 12 years in prison. Traditionally, the investigation, having completed its work, will hand the proceedings over to the court - it will decide what kind of punishment the officials deserve.
***
The war, no matter how it sounds, served as a kind of trigger for Ukrainian society. If earlier Ukrainians looked at corruption as a problem that was almost impossible to “root out,” and officials who “got burned” by bribes were only ridiculed on TV, today every scandal evokes anger and a desire to punish using the most severe methods.
Two Defense Department officials may have been stealing money from low-quality body armor for the Army. The deputy minister wanted to get a “share” in the purchase of generators. The Supreme Judge “resolved issues” of influential people using his connections, and the Privat group “laundered” the money of its clients using all available methods and schemes. Anti-corruption and law enforcement agencies today are trying to bring these cases to court, and what the court will decide is a matter of time. One thing is obvious - today, in the conditions of a virtually existential struggle for the integrity of the state, society is unlikely to calmly react to the fact that one of the defendants in high-profile crimes unexpectedly turns out to be free or the cases fall apart directly in the courtroom.
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