A former lawmaker in the Odesa region has been found guilty of fraud involving light fixtures

The High Anti-Corruption Court found Mykola Derevianko, a former member of the Odesa Regional Council, and the director of a construction company guilty of abuse of office and official forgery committed as part of an organized group.

According to the High Anti-Corruption Court’s press service, the court sentenced the former deputy to 4 years and 6 months of imprisonment and barred him from holding positions involving organizational, managerial, administrative, or economic functions in government bodies and at state-owned or municipal enterprises, for a period of 3 years.

Vladimir Gerasymchuk, director of Ukrmezhbud LLC, was sentenced to 4 years in prison with a ban on holding similar positions in business entities of all forms of ownership for a period of 2 years and 6 months.

In addition, the court granted the civil claim filed by the SAPO prosecutor and ordered the convicted individuals to jointly pay over 16.3 million hryvnias to the Tsebrykivka Village Council in the Odesa region.

On May 1, 2024, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine notified the deputy of his status as a suspect in causing 16.4 million hryvnias in losses to the state through the installation of street lighting in one of the territorial communities of the Odesa region during 2018–2020. In May, losses of 10.4 million hryvnias were uncovered, and an additional 6 million hryvnias in losses were uncovered in November 2023.

The participants in the scheme artificiallydividedthe procurement into parts, each of which did not exceed 1.5 million hryvnias in cost. This allowed the fraudsters to conclude contracts without using the electronic procurement system, inflate the cost of the products by more than six times, and include false data regarding their volumes in the certificates of completion. 

Mykola Derevianko and four other individuals are also accused of organizing a group that falsified documents and used them to fraudulently appropriate state property and launder proceeds obtained through criminal means. On March 21, a judge of the High Anti-Corruption Court approved a plea agreement between the SAPO prosecutor and the defendant—former head of the Tsebrykivka Village Council in Odesa Oblast,Volodymyr Barnasevych. The case in question involved regional council deputyMykola Derevianko. The deputy and his wife are accused of fraud carried out on the basis of forged village council session decisions. As a result,chargeswere brought for the embezzlement of 4,000 hectares of land valued at over 240 million hryvnias. 

Кирило Бойко