Ukrainian nepotism in persons: Pshonka dynasty

The Lord God and Viktor Yanukovich conferred to Ukraine another Prosecutor General who is a devotee to the First one and of boundless commitment to the latter. The new head of supervision authority, Viktor Pshonka – a represents the dynasty of honoured judges and prosecutors, being currently not only an adornment of Prosecutor-General’s Office but also of the Ukrainian Parliament (the son — Artem Viktorovich) and of High Specialized Court of Ukraine on Criminal and Civil Cases (brother — Nikolay Pavlovich).

The Deputy Head of President’s Administration of Ukraine, Anna Herman has recently compared Viktor, Artem and Nikolay Pshonkas with the legendary American Kennedy dynasty. And although Hanna Nikolayevna did not inform who was tipped for the role of Lee Harvey Oswald, the Ukrainian journalists liked the comparison. All the more, the family of Prosecutor General of Ukraine is legendary as well; the relations of Viktor Pshonka with the President of Ukraine are within no less gossip than his relations with the Lord God.

It is alleged that, e.g. in 2005 Viktor Yanukovich became the godfather of the son of the current Prosecutor General, Artem, and also that the Prosecutor General applies himself to construction of churches at his own expense. All these rumours are strongly denied by Viktor Pshonka. He said: “No, he is (the President) not a godfather but our families are friends; no, I do not build myself but contribute money for construction”.

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Family and political ties

The official biography of the most outstanding representative of new prosecutors and judges dynasty is as modest as the cemeterial wreath. The new Prosecutor General of Ukraine was born on February 6, 1954 in the village of Sergeyevka, Slavyansk district, (of for shure) Donetsk region. He studied at school, served in the army, in 1975 he followed his elder brother Nikolay’s steps, and entered Kharkov Law Institute, where upon graduation in 1980 he was assigned for a job placement as investigating officer of Prosecutor’s Office of Kramatorsk, Donetsk region. Soon, the young lawyer became the Prosecutor’s Assistant of Kramatorsk, but in 1983 he cut ties to the work in law and took the path of building the communism – he headed the administrative services branch of Kramatorsk city committee of CPSU.

It is worth mentioning that the appointment of 29-year old assistant of the city prosecutor, who did not previously worked at the party organs even a day, directly to the position of the head of department of city Committee proves to be an unprecedented fact. Although, this is the same thing as happened to Viktor Pshonka with his sudden appointment to the position of Prosecutor of Kramatorsk in 1986. Nevertheless he had only 3 years of experience of work in the prosecution authorities and at no positions of high responsibility. Who was the one to “promote” Viktor Pshonka remains an enigma. The rumours are that the current Prosecutor General of Ukraine owes much to the relatives of his wife, Olga Gennadyevna, for his career successes at the beginning of his professional history.

The former commercial employee, Olga Pshonka worked at the Bureau of Commercial Expert Reviews during those times in Kramatorsk, which she further headed in 1992. Together with her husband she moved to Donetsk in 1997 and, after a while, she became the president of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry, defended a Ph.D. thesis in Economics. She is currently the first Vice President of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Donetsk, and, simulateously one of theclosest friends of Lyudmila Yanukovich. Both madams are related not only in terms of their love of the beautiful (Olga Gennadyevna and Lyudmila Aleksandrovna – are famous theatregoers in the city) but also in terms of their hard women fate. They both remain residing at their historical homeland after their husbands had moved to Kiev…

Olga Pshonka and Lyudmila Yanukovich (source: Ostrov Internet publication http://www.ostro.org)

Viktor Pshonka had been in charge for 11 years of the Kramatorsk Prosecutor’s Office until he was called out to Donetsk in 1997 to the position of the First Deputy Prosecutor’s of Donetsk region Gennady Vasilyev. According to Viktor Pavlovich (Pshonka) it was then that he got acquainted with Donetsk governor Viktor Yanukovich.

After a year, Gennady Vasilyev moved to Kiev on the occasion of being elected as the Member of Parliament of Ukraine, and the Prosecutor’s Office of Donetsk region was headed by Viktor Pshonka who became good friends with the governor. At the same time, a new star of another outstanding contemporary lawyer and politician, Artem Pshonka appeared in the Prosecutor’s Office of Kramatorsk.

Artem Pshonka

Artem Viktorovich (Pshonka) was born in the same city of Kramatorsk in 1976. In 1998, while a student of Donetsk State University, he was placed as a trainee to the Prosecutor’s Office of Kramatorsk. The next year he gained a diploma majoring in Law and kept on fighting for the rule of law while occupying the positions of assistant, associate assistant and deputy of the Prosecutor of Kramatorsk. According to the assurances of Kramatorsk inhabitants, the Prosecutor of the city was only a figurehead, but it was Artem Pavlovich (Pshonka) who actually managed the supervision authority. How successful that management was can be evidenced with the portfolios of shares of large industrial enterprises of the city, which appeared to be the ownership of Artem’s mother, Olga Gennadyevna.

In November 2003, the repeated Prosecutor General of Ukraine, Svyatoslav Piskun, who had little liking to Viktor Pshonka and even tried to free the Prosecutor’s Office of Donetsk region from him in 2002, was forced for the first time to resign. By the way, Pshonka managed to remain at his position owing to protection on the part of Viktor Yanukovich and Gennady Vasilyev who became the first Vice-Speaker of Ukrainian Parliament. After resignation of Piskun, his irreconcilable adversary Vasilyev became the Prosecutor General and Viktor Pshonka gained the position of Deputy Prosecutor General.

At this position, Viktor Pshonka worked for just a little more than a year, and the only things he was eminent for appeared to be flat and land lot fortuitous events. After obtaining the luxurious apartments in the capital, in the building No.45/49 in Vladimirskaya street (just opposite the National Opera), a new Deputy Prosecutor General did not pay any attention to the fact that he had already a living space in Donetsk and therefore could not claim the housing in the capital on account of Ukrainian tax payers. Well, it happens.

However, the flat affair is just a mere trifle comparing to the “request according to the procedure of article 20 of the Law of Ukraine “On Prosecutor’s Office” that was signed by Pshonka and addressed to the Kiev City Council on allotment of 8 land lots in the very downtown of the capital (Ovrutskaya, Sretenskaya, Streletskaya, Turgenevskaya streets) in favour of unknown Trest “Yurkovitsa-Zhytlobud”, Limited Liability Company. On July 15, 2004, the Kiev City Council had to satisfy the appetites of Viktor Pavlovich (Pshonka) and vest a land in the city centre under lease (which means actually free of charge) to the firm, which was, by hearsay, owned by the management of Prosecutor’s Office.

We write “had to” because the Kiev authorities would hardly venture voluntarily upon such a step legally provided by several articles of Criminal Code. But there was no way out – the method of seizure of another’s property tried-and-true already in Donetsk worked the same in Kiev. The Prosecutor-General’s Office initiated several criminal cases regarding the administration of the Kiev Mayor’s Office, which were safely dismissed after allotment of sweet land lots for housing construction. Due to this single operation already the executives of the Prosecutor General’s Office saved several millions of dollars, which Trest Yurkovitsa-Zhytlobud, LLC had to pay to the city treasury if the owners of this firm were less honoured people.

In December 2004, Viktor Pavlovich had to leave the Prosecutor General’s Office of Ukraine due to “orange revolution”. Soon after, his son left profitable Kramatorsk for Donetsk to lead an uneventful life at the position of Associate Assistant Prosecutor of Kirov district. But the talent was not to be lost, and in 2006 Pshonka junior was appointed to the Deputy Prosecutor of Gorlovka – to the team of the favourite child of Viktor Pavlovich, former Deputy Prosecutor of Donetsk region, Natalia Marchuk, who, due to the same grounds, “orange revolution” had to leave regional Prosecutor’s Office and settle with the position of the Prosecutor of Gorlovka.

In March 2006, Artem Viktorovich (Pshonka) became the Member of the 5th  Convocation of the Parliament of Ukraine as a representative of the Party of Regions (No.128 in the electoral list). From November 2007, he was the Member of the 6th Convocation of the Parliament of Ukraine as a representative of the Party of Regions (No.149 in electoral list). Both terms he was the head of subcommittee in the Committee of Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine (Ukrainian Parliament) for Combating Organized Crime and Corruption; since February 2011, he is the Deputy Chairman of this committee. The fight cannot be better than the fighters…

Well, what regards Viktor Pavlovich, he was re-appointed to the Deputy Prosecutor General of Ukraine in 2006 with the only difference that Aleksandr Medvedko was in charge of the office. It happened soon after his benefactor Viktor Yanukovich became again a Prime Minister. According to the members of the parliament from the Party of Regions, they voted for appointment of Medvedko to the position of Prosecutor General in 2005 only under condition of Viktor Pshonka being a Deputy Prosecutor General. But Viktor Pavlovich (Pshonka) had to wait for more than a year for his long-expected return to the office on Reznitskaya Street.

In June 2010 after the victory of Yanukovich at presidential elections, Viktor Pshonka became the first Deputy Prosecutor General. On November 4, 2010, he was appointed to the Prosecutor General of Ukraine.

In the name of the father and of the son…

A distinctive feature of Pshonka family appears to be their incredible piousness, which in some cases assumes the expressed clinical challenge. Different hierarchy is an indispensable attribute of all solemn meetings at the Prosecutor General’s Office of Ukraine. This is of no surprise – while Viktor Pshonka was in charge of the Prosecutor’s Office of Donetsk region, the holy fathers visited it as clerks going to work, guiding their clergy children and toiling in the vineyards of general supervision.

It had been already two years before the appointment of Viktor Pshonka that, by vigils of the employees of regional Prosecutor’s Office and primarily by the Assistant Regional Prosecutor, Rafael Izmailovich Kuzmin, the construction of the Church of Intercession of the Holy Virgin was initiated in Donetsk, the miner’s capital. The full name of Rafael Izmailovich we provide for our sophisticated readers not to mix it with his cousin, Renat Ravelyevich who is now in the position of the First Deputy Prosecutor General of Ukraine. Therefore, we would like to explain that the issue refers to the Deputy Chairman of Anti-Monopoly Committee, who in 1994, while being the Assistant Prosecutor of Kiev district of the city of Donetsk, was apprehended by the joint operational group of regional Prosecutor’s Office, regional Directorate of Internal Affairs and special police unit “Berkut” while taking the bribe from the security police. According to scandalous tongues, Kuzmin allegedly coped not to be taken to prison due to protection of the auntie of Rafael Izmailovich, Fedora Anatolyevna Kuzmina (mother of Renat Ravelyevich), to whom the former regional Prosecutor, Gennady Vasilyev, had a special liking and who eventually took tutorship over her son Renat and two nephews – Rafael and Konstantin.

In the short time, the churn was commissioned. After appointment Viktor Pshonka to the regional Prosecutor, the prosecutor’s delight spread also over the land adjoining the church, where the enterprising guardians of the legal order decided to construct a marketplace. As everybody knows, Donbass guys do not piffle and in the shortest period at the border of Donetsk and Makeyevka, the one and only in the world market and temple complex “Pokrovsky” with provision of the whole range of services was constructed: while the opium “to the peoples” is provided at the church, the sales of associated goods is performed at the adjacent area.

In order to avoid any doubts that Donetsk Church of the Intercession of the Holy Virgin is in canonical unity with the Pokrovsky market, the name of commercial organization that constructed the market and possessing the title to it would be worth mentioning. The organization called “Kompaniya Svyataya Deva Maria”, Limited Liability Company (eng: Holy Virgin Mary Company) EGRPOU enterprise code 23773331, registered by the Executive Committee of Kalinisky district of Donetsk. In accordance with the Statute of Association, the company is incorporated for “assistance to implementation of the programme of social and economic development of Donetsk region”, аnd the mainstream activities include even 17 types of business activities. They cover trade and procurement, commercial mediation, and carrying out fairs and auction sales, and organization of game centres.

However, there is one nicety. While the church was constructed mostly on account of charitable contributions (they say that a single contribution of Gennady Vasilyev for erection of the bell tower amounted to 400 ths. dollars of his modest salary of a civil servant that he might have saved on breakfasts), the private capital was involved for the development of market infrastructure. Several naive entrepreneurs, having believed the prosecutor’s promises, became the incorporators of the company and contributed 600 ths. dollars in total. After that the Statute documents were redrafted, the entrepreneurs were withdrawn from the incorporators and their shares in authorized capital were appropriated by the persons miraculously close to the prosecutor’s family of Kuzmin. The court restored the rights of deceived ex-incorporators but the court decision has not been implemented so far – arguing with the first Deputy Prosecutor General of Ukraine and his cousin is more trouble than it is worth…

Viktor Pshonka is also familiar with charitable works. According to assurances of Prosecutor General’s fellow countrymen a nunnery was constructed in his native village of Sergeyevka, Slavyansk district of Donetsk region, at the cost of his personal finances. The opening ceremony took place in October 2005 in attendance of Viktor Pavlovich, his son Artem and the wife. However, Viktor Pshonka himself refused to have anything to do with allegation of such big charitable contributions for church construction – as there was no such salary to allow that, as he said.

Olga Gennadyevna keeps pace with her husband. In honour of her celestial protectress, Holy Equal-to-the-Apostles Olga, she constructed a church at Donetsk Chamber of Commerce and Industry, where she sork as a President. And now she has an opportunity to exercise her religious needs directly at the workplace.

One cannot but melt with joy while reading the interview of the wife of Prosecutor General of Ukraine. It appears that one can just (provided for sufficient amount of money) cope with that eternal lack of time for personal development. “Upon creation of this temple everybody of us obtained a wonderful and priceless opportunity for daily visits to it thus eliminating the time for travelling to the church”, — said Olga Gennadyevna. But she would rather impart where she got the money to buy the diamonds.

Off the law

Atrocity – this how local journalists can describe in a word the atmosphere prevailing in prosecution authorities of Donetsk region during Pshonka times. By that time the “bandits” period of primary accumulation of capital finished in the land of spoil tips and the “prosecutor” period started. There were no mobs coming to the entrepreneurs with the bats – their bonnet was filled with the investigating officers of the prosecutor’s office with a detention report or a writ of seizure. Moreover, nobody took care to observe at least the semblance of legitimacy.

The whole period of employment of Viktor Pshonka at the position of Prosecutor of Donetsk region was accompanied by scandals. The riot of lawlessness became the “landmark” of the region, and the human right activists still look back with indignation to the atmosphere of permissiveness. These stories were hardly published in the papers – Donetsk journalists of the day knew what to publish and to tell about. However there were, still not numerous, but quite flamboyant exceptions.

Thus, “Delovoy Donbass” paper (eng: Business Donbass) published a representative example of relations between the citizens and the employees of the regional prosecutor’s office in 2001 who, under the order of Pshonka “fostered” the director of provincial cafe that dared to report on the investigating officer of district prosecutor’s office. Being quite mellow this investigating officer, after leaving the office, visited the fateful cafe where he decided to urinate directly at the bar counter, alleging as his reason that prosecutors were allowed to do everything. The attempts of employees of catering unit to take the guardian of the law to the toilet failed: the drunken investigating officer broke the dishware, destroyed the sanitary ware but did the business where he planned to.

The naive director the cafe lodged the claim the next day to the Prosecutor’s Office of Donetsk region. But instead of explaining to the guardian of law the principles of using the bowl urinal they initiated a criminal case at the prosecutor’s office against the very director accusing him of non-payment of taxes. They hazed the entrepreneur for three years. The cafe was made of course bankrupt and its director was made physically impaired. Eventually they had to close the criminal case at the prosecutor’s office due to absence of crime in the act. But each time the entrepreneur started demanding at least the excuses from prosecutor’s office the criminal case was revived again.

Viktor Pavlovich left the former director of destroyed cafe in peace only after the case was given publicity and appeared in newspapers; the editorial wise crackers supported the article with photo collage, at which a famous “Manneken Pis” sculpture from Brussels was shown. The artist made additions to the picture in terms of stream, gave additional naturalism to the “boy”, depicted a Law of Ukraine “On Prosecutor’s Office” in the free hand and supported the illustration with inscription “Off the law”.

The elder brother of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine, Nikolay Pshonka who is currently a Deputy Chairman of the High Specialized Court of Ukraine on Criminal and Civvil cases

The story that happened to Vladimir Altynnik at the early 2000s is also an indicative one. He was the head of Donetsk regional branch of the State Property Fund of Ukraine from 1994 to October 1999. Vladimir Nikolayevich (Altynnik) was a symbolic figure in the miners’ capital. Being the former secretary of Donetsk city committee of CPSU he was quite influential and had extensive relations. That is why he was very surprised when suddenly received an offer to leave “at his own accord” and make way for Sergey Lazarenko – the closest associate of the businessman, Aleksandr Leschinsky (who is currently a member of the Ukrainian Parliament from the Party of Regions). It is the very former prosecutor of Leninsky district of Donetsk, Sergey Zhorzhevich Lazarenko, who in March 2006 was detained on suspicion in organization of criminal attempt upon own wife (they parcelled the property gained in working to death), and searched for his daughter in 2010, a student of Kiev Institute of International Relations that was kidnapped.

Altynnik rode rusty but finally vacated the office. But the “new Donbass dwellers” who were not used to repeat their offers that cannot be refused twice, decided to teach the lesson to the recalcitrant so that it would not become a habit for others. After three months and a half after his resignation Altynnik was apprehended, and the Prosecutor’s Office of Donetsk region as represented by the then Deputy of Pshonka, Yury Udartsov (who is currently a Deputy Prosecutor General of Ukraine) accused the former civil servant of abuse of power.

During those times the Prosecutor’s Office was the one to issue the arrest warrants. Only from the third attempt the lawyers of Altynnik managed to obtain a judgement on the change of the measure of restraint for recognizance not to leave. At the exit from Pre-Trial Detention Facility he was again apprehended and arrested – the regional prosecutor’s office composed another episode of its alleged criminal activity. This time the incrimination to the former head of regional branch of the State Property Fund of Ukraine related to “grand larceny”.

Due to severity of the accusation the criminal case against Altynnik according to the court of original jurisdiction was reviewed by the Court of Appeal of Donetsk region. And there it was discovered that the one served time at the Pre-Trial Detention Centre without any grounds – the warrant was missing. The thing is that before June 28, 2001, the old version of article 156 of the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine was in force, in accordance to which the detention in custody for the period of up to 6 months could be authorized only by the Prosecutor of the region or the prosecutor of similar level. In that case the signatures of Viktor Pavlovich Pshonka were required. And the signature of Pshonka on the writ of detention for Altynnik was missing – only a kind of flourish of unknown origin was made on the document. It turned out in the court that neither Pshonka nor his closest associate Udartsov (they say that they are married to sisters) had any idea of the procedure of prolongation of detention in custody and mixed it with the order of extension of period of preliminary investigation.

The scandal was so big that the court could not do anything but issue a ruling on initiation of criminal case (the court had such powers during those years) upon the fact of illegal detention of Vladimir Altynnik at the pre-trial centre and send him to the Prosecutor General of Ukraine. Of course it did not have any repercussions for Pshonka and Udartsov and the cases initiated by the court were safely closed at the Prosecutor’s General Office. What refers to the accused person the judgement of conviction was delivered to him, however it concerned the less significant episode related to violations during privatization of one uncompleted construction project in Donetsk. The former head of regional branch of the State Property Fund of Ukraine suffered a conviction of two-year imprisonment with suspended execution of sentence – i.e. even without having criminal records.

But the greatest fame was gained by Viktor Pshonka and his son Artem (the same as by Yury Udartsov) due to prosecution of Slavyansk journalist Igor Aleksandrov.

“Aleksandrov case”

The appointment of Viktor Pshonka to the position of Prosecutor of Donetsk region coincided with the appearance of the most infamous pages in the history of Ukrainian procuratorship, i.e. the prosecution of the journalist from Slavyansk, a director of TORTV Company, Igor Aleksandrov. In 1998, the same Yury Udartsov that occupied the position of the Prosecutor of Slavyansk signed the letter of accusation on criminal case initiated by the prosecutor’s office with regard to the journalist. Defamation was incriminated to Aleksandrov (there was such an article in the Criminal Code of Ukraine during those times) in relation to the businessman Aleksandr Leschinsky who was called the “vodka king of Donbass” by Aleksandrov. But for some reason it was Udartsov that took it in evil part but not the owner of several distilleries, Leschinsky. To be more exact, it was Pshonka.

After that the odious legal proceedings lasted for 2 year and a half. On July 13, 1998, the judge Vasiliy Sebelev pronounced a sentence, by which Igor Aleksandrov was found guilty in defamation regarding Leschinsky and deforced of the right to carry out journalist and commentary activity for the period of five years. Donetsk Regional Court vacated the sentence and sent back the case for a new consideration. Eventually, on July 10, 2000, the criminal case against Aleksandrov was closed by the court due to lack of appeal from the person affected – it turned out that Leschinsky did not apply any legal statement to the prosecutor’s office. Udartsov was already a Deputy Regional Prosecutor at that time.

The journalist did not make up his mind and claimed initiating a criminal case with regard to the deputy of Pshonka. After refusal signed by the then Prosecutor General of Ukraine, Mikhail Potebenko, Aleksandrov lodged a complaint to the European Court of Human Rights. At the same time he was on air with his TV programme “Bez retushi” (eng: Retouch Free) exposing corruption ties between the local criminal world and the top ranking law enforcement officers.

During autumn 2000 – spring 2001, the former militiamen, Oleg Solodun and Mikhail Serbin appeared three times in the TVprogrammes of Aleksandrov with allegation of the management of militia (police) and prosecutor’s office of Donetsk region in corruption and ties with organized criminal groups. In the fourth programme, Igor Aleksandrov planned to demonstrate the video from the tape that was handed over to him by Solodun and Serbin containing the record on which the members of Kramatorsk organized criminal group “Semnadtsatyi uchastok” (eng: 17th site) discussed how much they had paid or had to pay their protectors from militia or prosecutor’s office. The issue in the programme was supposed to be referred to Viktor Pshonka and his son Artem as well – the journalist received a picture on which Artem Viktorovich (Pshonka) was with the crime boss of Kramatorsk with their arms around each other.

The member of Ukrainian Parliament Artem Viktorovich Pshonka in the session room of the Ukrainian Parliament

But the fourth programme did not go on air – in the morning on July 3, 2001 at the entrance to TOR TV Company, an assault was made upon Igor Aleksandrov. They beat him with the bats. On July 7, Aleksandrov died without regaining consciousness.

As primarily announced by the Prosecutor General’s Office of Ukraine at the instigation of Donetsk law enforcement officers, the violent killer that operated two bats at once appeared to be a man of small timber, Yury Veredyuk, having neither regular job nor definite dwelling place and being ill with pulmonary tuberculosis. The ridicule of indictment was obvious to everybody except for the Prosecutor of Donetsk region. In October 2001, after Prosecutor General’s Office transferred the criminal case on accusation of Veredyuk for the proceedings at Donetsk Regional Prosecutor’s Office, Pshonka stated at the meeting of investigation group that the change of investigative jurisdiction evidenced the high level of confidence personally on the part of Prosecutor General which could be justified only by taking the criminal case on accusation of Veredyuk to the court. At that very time Pshonka required from his subordinates “not to pay any attention to the insinuations, which may appear in media regarding the fact that Veredyuk could not have committed the crime”.

The falsification of investigation of murder of Igor Aleksandrov involved huge resources from the very beginning. The operational investigative group of the Prosecutor General’s Office was under field supervision and their telephones were wiretapped. Some persons managed to steal the original report on the opinion of experts that carried out interrogation of Veredyuk using lie detector from the case papers and insert a forged one executed on the sheets of paper stolen from experts. The pictures and documents compromising the Prosecutor of Donetsk region and his son disappeared from the case papers.

An acquaintance verdict for Yury Veredyuk delivered by the judge of the Court of Appeal of Donetsk region on May 17, 2002, turned out to be lethal both for Veredyuk (he died on July 19, 2002 as a result of poisoning) and for two more witnesses, as well as for Slavyansk militiaman, Andrey Ryabtsev. Ryabtsev tried to bring to Kiev, to the Prosecutor General’s Office, some important information for the investigating officer Golik but failed – on his way to Kiev he fell out of the car in the territory of Kharkov region. Moreover, he fell out in such a way that the passenger compartment turned out to be spattered with blood. The Prosecutor’s Office of Donetsk region issued a ruling in this connection, of course, on refusal to initiate the criminal case.

The investigation of the murder case of Slavyansk journalist was carried on. On September 24, 2003, the Prosecutor General’s Office announced another clearance of high profile crime. On September 3, 2004, the murder trial started again in Lugansk, but now the Rybaki brothers appeared in the prisoner’s box, businessmen with criminal reputation and the direct crime committers Ruslan Tursunov and Aleksandr Onyshko. The new version did not differ much from the previous one: one of the murderers could not physically handle the bat as recently underwent the surgery on hernia excision, another was on the beach with his girl-friend as of the day of the murder, and the heads of the crime did not have any motives to dispatch the director of TV company.

The murderers were convicted but that did not eliminate the number of outstanding issues. The version that seniour Pshonka and the Head of Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Donetsk region Vladimir Malyshev were art and part in the murder of dissenting journalist was actively elaborated by the law enforcement authorities in 2005 and the alleged murderers included – the Head of the Directorate of Internal Affairs of Makeyevka of Donetsk region, Albert Vinnichuk, the officer of Criminal Investigations Office of the Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine in Donetsk region, Sergey Shlomin and the Head of the Counter Narcotics Department of the Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine in Kiev region, Aleksandr Gerasimenko, who were even apprehended in April 2005 (however for another episode – they were incriminated with poisoning Yury Veredyuk). But after signing the “memorandum” in autumn 2005 between the then President of Ukraine, Viktor Yuschenko and his alleged opponent Viktor Yanukovich that investigation was blocked. It is no secret that closing the criminal cases in reference to the persons proximate to Yanukovich was one of unofficial provisions of the “memorandum”.

Victim of people’s regime

In the meantime, in autumn 2005, one more criminal case against Viktor Pshonka investigated by the Prosecutor General’s Office of Ukraine was “let drop”.

The criminal case was initiated in connection with the invaluable service which the Deputy Prosecutor General’s Office Pshonka rendered to certain Ukrsplav, Closed Joint-Stock Company. To be more exact, the service was quite measurable – owing to Viktor Pavlovich almost 150 mln. hryvnias (UAH) were withdrawn from the budget in favour of the blacklegs. However, the sophisticated readers might of course know that the founding father of Ukrsplav, CJSC is the current member of the Ukrainian Parliament from the Party of Regions, Yevgeniy Geller and the firm itself enjoys protection of the richest man of the country Renat Akhmetov.

It was as follows. In October 2004, at the Headquarters of the Security Service of Ukraine they found out that Ukrsplav CJSC fiddled around with the fake export and sent the by-products of processing non-ferrous metals described as “TC-150 bow collector for mining electric locomotives”. In particular, the customs’ clearance of those very “bow collectors” with the declared value of 406.4 mln. hryvnias was carried out in Mariupol Port at that time. Actually, the aluminous waste being placed in the packages with colourful labels could be sold only at the price of scrap metal and all this scheme was arranged for the purpose of export VAT refund from the state budget.

All attempts of the officers of the Security Service of Ukraine to hinder the departure of Votan vessel flying the flag of Antigua allegedly with the cargo of “bow collectors” failed. Then on October 26, 2004, by joint efforts of the Department of Counterintelligence Protection of the Economy of the State and the K Chief Directorate of the Security Service of Ukraine the ruling was prepared on the seizure of goods in accordance with the article 12 of the Law of Ukraine “On organization and legal grounds of organized crime control”. The ruling was to be authorized by the Deputy Prosecutor General of Ukraine Pshonka.

Around 3 p.m. on October 26, 2004, the ruling was submitted to Pshonka for signature. Viktor Pavlovich examined the materials and signed the document. After that he held the ruling in his hands for some time, thought a bit and asked the officer of the Security Service of Ukraine to wait for him at the reception room and left. Having returned the Deputy Prosecutor General took a pen and started carefully featuring his signature that was put on the ruling of the seizure of goods. The same day at 19:35 in Votan vessel, by the order of the commander of Mariupol near-border detachment the state frontier of Ukraine was closed and the ship left safely for Romanian port of Constanta.

On November 1, 2004, upon the fact of illegal trade of aluminium products under the veil of “bow collectors”, the Investigation Department of the Security Service of Ukraine initiated the criminal case No.236. However all efforts to prevent illegal VAT refund turned out to be ineffective – the management of the State Tax Administration of Ukraine ignored the letter of the Deputy Chairman of the Security Service of Ukraine Igor Drizhchany, and performed immediately the refund of VAT tax credit to Ukrsplav CJSC in November-December 2004 including 134.4 mln. hryvnias in hard cash.

During interrogations in the Main Investigations Directorate of the Prosecutor General’s Office in summer 2005 Viktor Pavlovich affirmed that he never signed such a ruling and the officer of the Security Service of Ukraine that had brought a ruling to him for signature just lied through his teeth. And the thing regarding the fact that he featured the place of signature was explained by him as precaution measure to prevent some abuser from signing the ruling instead of the Deputy Prosecutor General.

Then the decision was made to carry out the seizure of the original of the ruling at the Headquarters of the Security Service of Ukraine on the seizure of goods that was corrupted by Pshonka and send the document for expert review in order to establish if there was any signature of Viktor Pavlovich under the scrawls. But then the “memorandum” occurred and the criminal case upon the fact of abuse of official position in favour of Ukrsplav CJSC was declared as intrigues of ill-willers and retired into archive, and Viktor Pshonka changed again into the symbol of honesty, integrity and expertise. But isn’t it the person type that a Prosecutor General of Ukraine could be?

Volodymyr BOYKO