A judge from Kherson region remained in occupation and received a Russian tax number

A judge from the Kherson region may be fired because she did not return to work after a business trip to Odesa and stayed in the occupied territory. She explained that she could not leave because of her sick mother and the lack of humanitarian corridors, but she received a Russian tax number.

This was discussed at a meeting of the second disciplinary chamber of the High Council of Justice.

Liubov Nemchenko, a judge of the Economic Court of Kherson region, may be dismissed for a disciplinary offense, according to a decision of the Second Disciplinary Chamber of the High Council of Justice.

Nemchenko has been working as a judge since 2003. After the start of the full-scale war, she remained in occupied Kherson. In August 2022, she was seconded to the Economic Court of Odesa Oblast, but did not report for work. Even after the liberation of Kherson in November 2022, the judge did not move to Odesa, but evacuated to the occupied left bank of the Dnipro River, to the village of Askania Nova.

In her explanations to the HCJ, Nemchenko claimed that she could not leave because of her sick 85-year-old mother and the lack of humanitarian corridors. She noted that moving out of the occupation is now possible, but time-consuming, and she does not dare to do so because of her mother's condition, which requires constant care.

The head of the court, Svitlana Litvinova, said that the evacuation was not organized, each judge decided individually. Nemchenko did not ask for help - she only took her personal file and workbook. Other colleagues left the occupation in March-August 2022.

In addition, Nemchenko received a tax number in the Russian Federation - according to her, in order to obtain an electronic signature and send letters to Ukrainian authorities. Later she learned that this could be done through the Ukrainian service Diia and received a signature there, but she still had her Russian TIN.

In July 2024, her mother broke her femoral neck, after which the woman was sent for treatment to occupied Simferopol, where Nemchenko also went. She asked not to be dismissed until the end of hostilities, assuring that she was not cooperating with the occupiers and wanted to remain a judge in Ukraine.

In April, the Chamber found the judge guilty of a disciplinary offense and decided to submit a request for her dismissal to the High Council of Justice, which is to make the final decision.

Анна Бальчінос