Former Kherson education official is suspected of embezzling millions of budget funds

A former official from the Kherson MBA was served with a notice of suspicion of misappropriation of almost UAH 4 million in budget funds. The person in question is Tetiana Safronenko, who in 2022 served as deputy head of the Kherson City Council's education department and later began working for the occupation administration.

This was reported by the MIST publication.

According to the investigation, in the summer of 2022, Safronenko colluded with the chief accountant of the department and organized the illegal accrual of bonuses in three educational institutions of the city. The total amount of damage to the state budget amounted to almost UAH 4 million.

The largest amount of money - over UAH 2.4 million - was paid to Kherson educational complex No. 11, about UAH 1 million to specialized school No. 30, and over UAH 500 thousand to educational complex No. 15. Some of these funds, according to witnesses, were returned through so-called "kickbacks" - employees were forced to pay back up to 90% of the bonuses they received.

The National Police notified Safronenko of suspicion under Part 5 of Article 191 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine - misappropriation of property in a particularly large scale by prior conspiracy. The sanction of the article provides for up to 12 years in prison.

It was also established that after the start of the full-scale invasion of Russia, Tatiana Safronenko began to cooperate with the occupation authorities and later fled to the temporarily occupied territory. Her name matches the data of the current deputy of the so-called "Minister of Education of the Kherson region" in the occupation administration.

Earlier, Intent wrote about how the former director of a Kherson school was suspected of embezzling budget funds on a particularly large scale. It happened during the occupation. Now the woman faces up to 12 years in prison.

Ірина Глухова