Sponsor of Odesa ex-mayor Hurvits and friend of regionalist Kivalov: who is behind the Odesa clinic Odrex, which is linked to patient deaths. Part 4

Leonid Kuchuk is the founder of the Odrex clinic, which became embroiled in a scandal due to alleged improper treatment that may have caused patients to lose their health and even die. In previous materials, UNN has already described the history of the clinic's establishment and told about the nominal owners of the companies behind Odrex. The next part of the investigation will be dedicated to the clinic's founder, Leonid Kuchuk, and his closest partner, Tigran Arutyunyan.

According to our information, Leonid Kuchuk currently lives abroad. However, he continues to control everything that happens with his business in Ukraine.

The "buried" scandal with the clinic's equipment

"Odrex Medical House" opened at the end of 2012. The clinic was positioned as the most modern and equipped with the latest medical technology. Advanced medical equipment, including an MRI machine manufactured by Toshiba - the only one in Ukraine at that time. Everything was nice, expensive, comfortable. It seemed that Odesa had indeed received a European-level hospital.

Serhiy Kalinchuk, a medic by education, was appointed as the head of the clinic at that time, who, however, already had a scandalous corruption trail.

His work at Odrex was not without scandal either. Today, it is difficult to find details of the events that unfolded in 2012-13 on the Internet, but we managed to find out that at that time there were suspicions of a corrupt component in the process of equipping Odrex. What exactly was meant? We do not know. Perhaps Kalinchuk "profited" from the purchase of equipment. Or perhaps the clinic received equipment that should have been delivered not to it, but, for example, to a municipal hospital...

Be that as it may, this story is already "buried" publicly, and Kalinchuk quickly resigned from the position of head of Odrex.

The clinic continued to operate without him. Later, Tigran Arutyunyan became its head, and his long-time business partner Leonid Kuchuk positioned himself as the author of the idea and founder. As we have already written, both started with the gambling business - they owned companies for manufacturing slot machines and managing gambling halls.

Gurvits' sponsor and a fugitive's relative

In addition to founding a gambling business, and later a clinic, Kuchuk is referred to in the media as a sponsor of the former mayor of Odesa, Eduard Gurvits. In 2006, Kuchuk allegedly had his quota in the elections to the city council and was even able to get his people elected. Malicious tongues then claimed that thanks to this, Kuchuk cleared the local gambling market of competitors.

In addition, Leonid Kuchuk is probably a relative of a certain Mykhailo Kuchuk - deputy mayor of Odesa during Gurvits' time. Mykhailo Kuchuk is suspected of creating an organized crime group and receiving bribes. According to the investigation, the suspect enriched himself by 300 thousand hryvnias every month by making decisions in favor of oligarchs Borys Kaufman and Oleksandr Hranovsky. Kuchuk was declared a suspect in absentia, as he fled Ukraine. He was also arrested in absentia.

In addition, Leonid Kuchuk also maintains ties with the former head of the Central Election Commission and former "regional", president of the Odesa Law Academy Serhiy Kivalov. The latter congratulated the clinic on its 10th anniversary and sent students there for internships.

Currently, Leonid Kuchuk has officially withdrawn from the founders and beneficiaries of LLC "Dim Medytsyny" (House of Medicine), which is involved in the investigation into the death of Odesa businessman Adnan Kivan. Officially, he has no relation to other companies under which the clinic operated or operates (LLC "Medical House "Odrex" and LLC "Center of Medicine").

At one time, Kuchuk was a co-owner of the insurance company "Odrex", which provided services in the field of medical insurance. However, according to open sources, all licenses of this company have already been revoked.

Today, Kuchuk, together with Arutyunyan, are the owners of LLC "Higher School of Medicine "Odrex". But what is interesting is that already in the midst of the judicial investigation, namely on December 10, 2025, Kuchuk, together with Maryna Arutyunyan and Mariya Pavlusenko, founded another company for providing medical services - LLC "MDO Pivden". This company has not yet managed to obtain a license from the Ministry of Health for medical activities. However, it is quite likely that against the backdrop of the scandal around the clinic, the deprivation of the "House of Medicine" license and a possible check of compliance with licensing conditions by other companies, the owners of "Odrex" decided to secure their business and establish another company, for which they later plan to obtain another license and continue to operate.

Maryna Arutyunyan is obviously a relative of Tigran Arutyunyan. Currently, she is the beneficiary of only the newly created company "MDO Pivden". At the same time, in open sources, a person with a similar full name appears in court materials on a claim by "UkrSibbank" and an application by LLC "Financial Company "Pozyka". The court proceedings began back in 2012 in the Khartsyzk City Court of Donetsk Oblast, and later continued in the Dobropillya City-District Court of Donetsk Oblast. The court ruling states that Maryna Arutyunyan took responsibility for a loan issued to another person. The amount of the loan taken in Swiss francs at the exchange rate at that time exceeded 570 thousand UAH. In addition, Maryna Arutyunyan from Khartsyzk appears in the database of the "Myrotvorets" Center. Whether the newly minted owner of "MDO Pivden" and the person appearing in the "Myrotvorets" database are one and the same person is unknown to us.

Kuchuk's loyal associate

In 2020, Tigran Arutyunyan, director of the Odrex clinic, became the head of the Armenian community of Odesa. He led it until May 2023. Such a position added a positive touch to the image of a respectable businessman and head of a private clinic. But, as we already know, Arutyunyan, together with Kuchuk, started with the gambling business.

Earlier, we wrote that the company "Odrex" emerged in the late 90s and initially engaged in repairing used, and later manufacturing, slot machines. This company was registered at 69/71 Rozkydaylivska Street in Odesa - the registration address for a large number of companies associated with the co-owners of the "Odrex" clinic.

By the early 2000s, as the media writes, the "Odrex" firm nevertheless began to produce its own slot machines and released up to 4 thousand "one-armed bandits" per year, some of which were exported, and gaming tables and roulette wheels were also produced.

The founders of the gambling business were Tigran Arutyunyan, Leonid Kuchuk, and Iryna Zaykova (also a co-founder of companies from the "Odrex" network).

In 2001, according to journalists, Kuchuk and Arutyunyan founded the firm "Nevada", which was to manage its own gaming halls. "Nevada" was registered at the same address on Rozkydaylivska. Later, this firm was re-registered to the Panamanian offshore company "Corporation DVD AG".

"Nevada" at one time worked in the Russian market as well. In Russian registers, we found 16 more companies related to the gambling business with similar names "Nevada-X" where "X" is the name of a Russian city or region. All these enterprises were opened in 2002-2003. It was at that time that the then "Odrex" with its slot machines and "Nevada" were actively expanding into foreign markets, including the Russian one. Today, all these firms have been liquidated.

In 2009, after the tragedy in a gambling hall in Dnipro (when 9 people died as a result of an explosion and subsequent fire), the authorities decided to "cut off the oxygen" to the gambling business. The then "Odrex" and "Nevada" faced a challenge that forced the owners to reorganize the business. Thus, in 2012, the "Odrex" clinic was opened, which was later headed by Arutyunyan. He was and remains a co-founder of the companies behind the clinic.

In addition to managing the clinic and the Armenian community of Odesa, Arutyunyan tried his hand at politics - in the 2020 elections, he ran for the Odesa City Council from the "Servant of the People" party. But he failed to become a deputy.

It is noteworthy that Arutyunyan, like Zaykova, was not in a hurry to get rid of his involvement in the gambling business. Only in May 2024 did he withdraw from the founders of the company "Galaxion", which is engaged in computer programming. On the Internet, you can find the website https://www.galaxion.company/uk/ of a company with a similar name. The website states that the company is engaged in creating online monitoring systems for casinos and slot clubs.

Instead of conclusions

The conducted investigation and the emergence of new stories of "Odrex" patients raise a logical question - did the clinic's owners transfer the approaches to its work from the business model of the gambling market of the early 2000s, when the main goal was to extract money from the client without taking into account the consequences?