Extortion and fraud: Elena Tishchenko accused lawyer Gutovskaya of committing a major scam worth millions of dollars

Elena, the ex-wife of banker Tishchenko, believes that Olga Gutovskaya, a lawyer, is the person operating as part of a large money extortion scheme.

A large-scale attack on large Ukrainian banks, and at the forefront of it is a little-known lawyer? The British company WWRT Limited, registered under the name of lawyer Olga Gutovskaya, received loan portfolios of domestic financial institutions from the Star Investment Van company for next to nothing and, obviously, intends to take advantage of this in its own interests. Thus, Elena Tishchenko (ex-wife of the owner of Fortuna Bank) accuses Gutovskaya and Co. of fraud and extortion of colossal sums of money.

Elena Tishchenko suggests: the same interested parties may actually be behind both structures (Star Investment Van and WWRT Limited). And the executor of the large-scale and, probably, criminal scheme was the Ukrainian lawyer Olga Gutovskaya , whose media ratings were artificially “inflated.”

Who is really attacking domestic banks and their owners and what is the role of lawyer Gutovskaya in this story? The details of the situation were highlighted in a new investigation by StopKora journalist Igor Khmury .

The first link of the scheme was an auction for the sale of assets of bankrupt banks, which was held by the Deposit Guarantee Fund. It was the CSF, through ProZorro, that put up for auction the loan portfolios of domestic financial institutions. As lawyer Igor Yasko , standard practice involves purchasing the assets of bankrupt banks at a price of 20 to 30% of their real value.

In the case of Fortuna Bank, the buyer was Star Investment Van. However, the total cost of the lot was... only 0.03% of the total value of all loans and collateral.

According to Elena Tishchenko, as soon as Star Investment Van bought out the debts, company representatives immediately began contacting management and large bank clients and demanding that each lot be purchased separately - at significantly inflated prices. Subsequently, Star Investment Van assigned the loans to another company - WWRT Limited by Olga Gutovskaya, but kept all the collateral for itself.

“And when they were already retreating, this fraudulent intent clearly emerged. Because they ceded rights only for loans. And Star Investment Van kept the deposit for himself. According to the laws of Ukraine, this is impossible. And according to the laws of any country, this is impossible. Because the pledge secures the fulfillment of the underlying obligation. It is exclusively linked to the loan. And by the fact that they kept the collateral for themselves, and gave up loans to the WWRT company, they have already shown that these are in fact the same people,” notes Tishchenko.

She suggests that the young lawyer Gutovskaya has become a kind of “face” of the company carrying out blackmail, including through artificially high “media recognition.”

Law enforcement officers will have to sort out this complicated story: as Elena Tishchenko reported, four criminal proceedings have already been initiated on these facts. StopCor will continue to closely monitor their progress.

Let us recall that the English company WWRT Limited, owned by “legal expert” Olga Gutovskaya, strangely acquired the rights to the loan obligations of a number of domestic banks for a small percentage. And this despite the fact that the lawyer does not have a large list of won cases on his record, and received a lawyer’s certificate... just six months ago.