This year, 2024, began with a number of high-profile corruption scandals, including those related to procurement by the Ministry of Defense. Without assessing them, one thing is clear: sooner or later, all of these cases will end up in court. Therefore, the question arises whether we will really get an independent review and a fair decision, or whether corrupt officials will be able to close all the issues in the usual way. In this context, UNN decided to recall high-profile cases involving servants of Themis and warn all people in robes against the idea of easy money.
One of the most high-profile events of the past year was the detention on May 15 of Vsevolod Knyazev, the head of the Supreme Court of Ukraine, for bribes totaling $2.7 million .
Such unlawful remuneration was supposed to facilitate the resolution of the case considered by the Grand Chamber of the Supreme Court. In particular, according to the NABU, Knyazev received money from people who advocated for a court decision in favor of oligarch, former owner of the Finance and Credit bank and former MP Kostiantyn Zhevago.
The case involves a certain lawyer's association, which, in fact, was a kind of back office and acted as an intermediary in organizing bribes for judges. Under the guise of legal services and legal support, the group members agreed with judges to make decisions in the interests of their "clients" for a certain "reward".
It is noted that on May 3, the members of the criminal organization received the first tranche, and on May 15, the second part of pre-identified funds ("marked bills") was transferred, and in fact the then Chairman of the Supreme Court was caught red-handed.
More than 30 searches were conducted in the Knyazev case. However, most of the "marked" bills out of the total amount of money provided as an unlawful benefit, according to SAPO prosecutor Oleksandr Omelchenko during the court hearing, have not yet been found.
According to the investigation, the funds were received by Knyazev for further transfer to other judges. Investigators also conducted searches in the homes of 18 judges who participated in the case.
The head of the SAPO, Oleksandr Klymenko, said in an interview with the Dzerkalo Tyzhnia that the investigation had seized "marked funds" from four judges. The media managed to identify three judges - possible defendants in the Knyazev case - whose offices were searched and found to have the missing "marked bills". These are judges of the Supreme Court in the Criminal Chamber of Cassation Zhanna Yelenina, Irina Grigorieva and Sergey Storozhenko.
Thus, almost 20 judges of the Supreme Court were compromised by the case against former Chief Justice Vsevolod Knyazev, and the level of trust in the highest judicial body of the state dropped to almost zero.
The case of the escape of former MP Oleksandr Shepelev, accused of a series of contract killings and high treason, and FSB agent, which was also considered by the panel of judges of the Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court, added fuel to the fire.
Judges Vyacheslav Marynych, Volodymyr Korol and Alla Makarovets unexpectedly decided to close one of the episodes of the case, which concerned bribery, due to what they considered insufficient evidence. As a result, the property of the former MP will not be confiscated under this episode . Although, according to experts interviewed by UNN, the Supreme Court judges did not have the right to directly examine any evidence.
In addition, the judges counted as part of the sentence Shepelev's unconfirmed stay in the Russian pre-trial detention center. He was detained in Russia following an extradition request from Ukraine. A year later, Russia refused to extradite the fugitive ex-MP to Ukraine, citing threats to its own national security. The Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine reported to UNN that they had not received any documents from the Russian side about Shepelev's stay in the detention center in Russia or his release from there. As it turned out, Shepelev is valuable to Russia because he was an FSB agent and a game player.
The Supreme Court panel also used the Savchenko law and counted Shepeleva's time in the pre-trial detention center on charges in other cases as part of his sentence.
Thus, judges Vyacheslav Marynych, Volodymyr Korol and Alla Makarovets recalculated Shepelev's sentence and tried to release him.
Commenting on this decision, experts interviewed by UNN, point out that the judges could have been interested in ruling in favor of the FSB agent.
The media also reported that Shepelev allegedly could have bought the Supreme Court's decision, and that Hryhoriy Mamka, an MP from the banned Opposition Platform - For Life, could have helped him do so. However, it was quickly deleted, although the trace in the search engine by keywords remained. Political analyst Oleksandr Kochetkov believes that law enforcement should verify this information.
Given that at least 14 Supreme Court judges who may have been involved in the Knyazev case have not yet been named, law enforcement agencies still have a lot of work to do.
In addition, at the end of 2023 , the NABU and the SAPO caught four judges of the Kyiv Court of Appeal red-handed - Vyacheslav Dziubin, Ihor Palenyk, Viktor Hlynianyi, and Yurii Slyva. They are suspected of receiving 35 thousand dollars in bribes.
According to the investigation, a judge of the Kyiv Court of Appeal suggested that one of the parties in the case satisfy the complaint to cancel the arrest of the property of a private company. According to media reports, it was about the cancellation of the arrest of two An-74TK-100 aircraft, which can be transformed from cargo to passenger and vice versa, and which were material evidence in criminal proceedings for obstructing the lawful activities of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. By the way, they are owned by the Estonian company EKA GRUPP OU, and the holders in Ukraine were Motor Sich JSC and Konstanta Airlines.
For this , the company's representative had to provide an undue benefit of $35 thousand to the intermediary judge and the three judges in the case. The judges lifted the arrest of one airplane. After receiving the bribe, the intermediary judge kept $10,000 for himself and put $25,000 in a whiskey box to pass on to his colleagues. After receiving the money, they divided it among themselves.
Last year, law enforcement officers caught smaller fish. In particular, the acting head of the Kominternivskyi district court in Odesa region was caught on bribes (almost 50 thousand hryvnias in bribes), as well as a judge of the procedural management of the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office of one of the district courts in Lviv region. According to media reports, this is the second time this judge has been caught red-handed.
Therefore, many questions arise, in particular, regarding the quality of integrity checks of current judges.