Five Kyiv Regional Council deputies and four of their relatives are suspected of fraud involving budget funds. The case concerns a scheme linked to payments under the ‘Turbota’ programme.
Prosecutor General Ruslan Kravchenko wrote about it on Telegram, and the National Police press service reported it.
Under the targeted ‘Turbota’ programme, residents of the Kyiv Region who need additional social protection, expensive treatment, have suffered serious illnesses or lost loved ones are entitled to receive financial assistance once a year. Police said that relatives and trusted associates of the deputies received payments without proper documentary proof, which in some cases could amount to hundreds of thousands of hryvnyas.
The investigation found that Kyiv Regional Council deputies systematically submitted requests for funds to be allocated to people close to them, for example, their parents or their wife’s parents. Subsequently, the head of the relevant department of the regional council approved such requests and prepared draft orders to allocate funds from the regional budget without proper grounds for the assistance itself or justification of its amount.
During checks, police documented cases of payments that significantly exceeded the indicative levels of targeted assistance set out in the programme. For example, between 2021 and 2025, the parents of one of those involved repeatedly received money under the ‘Turbota’ programme supposedly for treatment. The man and woman attached only formal documents to their applications for financial assistance: copies of passports and pension certificates, without documentary confirmation of the sums requested. At the same time, it emerged that these people were not in financial hardship. In particular, the deputy’s mother has purchased property and an expensive car in recent years with a total value of more than 3.5 million hryvnyas.
After the financial payments were transferred to the deputy’s parents’ bank accounts, the money was withdrawn in cash or fully or partially returned directly to the account of the deputy who initiated the allocation of the assistance. In this way, relatives were used as fictitious recipients to misappropriate budget funds.
In addition, by analysing the movement of funds, law enforcement officers identified individual cases in which the financial assistance received was used to pay for aesthetic medicine services, dentistry and other expenses that did not correspond to the stated grounds for receiving budget funds.
Overall, between 2021 and 2025, nearly 384 million hryvnyas in budget funds were paid to residents of the capital region under the ‘Turbota’ programme. Law enforcement officers have so far gathered evidence of fraudulent misappropriation of more than 3 million hryvnyas.
Following searches at the suspects’ workplaces and homes, as well as in their vehicles, police seized mobile phones, money, documentation and draft notes confirming the illegal activity.
On the basis of the evidence collected, nine people — Kyiv Regional Council deputies and close relatives — have been served with notices of suspicion. Depending on their role and involvement in the scheme, the suspects’ actions were classified under Parts 3 and 4 and Part 5 of Article 190 (Fraud) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.
The possible involvement of other people in similar cases of illegal use of budget funds under this programme is currently being checked. The pre-trial investigation is ongoing.
Under the article cited, those involved face up to 12 years’ imprisonment with confiscation of property.