In Odesa, law enforcement officers detained a lawyer suspected of attempting to obtain $315,000 on the pretext of having criminal proceedings against the head of a local charitable foundation discontinued.
This was reported by the Security Service of Ukraine and the Prosecutor General’s Office.
According to investigators, after searches were carried out in the criminal case, the lawyer offered to arrange, for money, for the offence to be reclassified under a less serious article. To do so, he allegedly planned to use connections with employees of the Security Service of Ukraine and the prosecution authorities.
At first, the lawyer demanded $250,000, and later increased the amount to $300,000. In addition, for $15,000 he promised to restrict access to court rulings authorising the searches in the Unified State Register of Court Decisions.
According to the Prosecutor General’s Office, on 1 October the lawyer received $15,000 and, investigators say, disposed of it at his own discretion.
He later continued to demand the main sum and proposed transferring $300,000 in cryptocurrency through a currency exchange point.
On 15 October, the client handed the money to employees of the exchange point, who were acting on the lawyer’s instructions. According to investigators, they were unaware of his alleged criminal intentions. Immediately afterwards, law enforcement officers detained the lawyer.
The lawyer has now been served with a notice of suspicion for a completed attempted acquisition of another person’s property by deception on an especially large scale — under Part 2 of Article 15 and Part 5 of Article 190 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.
The article carries a penalty of up to 12 years’ imprisonment with confiscation of property. The issue of selecting a preventive measure for the suspect is currently being decided.
The comprehensive measures were carried out under the procedural supervision of the Prosecutor General’s Office.
In accordance with Article 62 of the Constitution of Ukraine, a person is considered innocent until their guilt is proven in accordance with the law and established by a court’s guilty verdict.