In Odesa, producers of counterfeit goods worth 18 million were sentenced to a fine and suspended sentence

A court in Odesa has sentenced four defendants in cases of illegal manufacture and sale of excisable goods who organized the sale of illegally manufactured excisable goods through a chain of stores and closed telegram channels.

According to the press service of the Bureau of Economic Security (BES), three offenders were fined and another was sentenced to four years in prison with a one-year probation period.

Investigators found that each of the convicts created closed Telegram channels through which they sold counterfeit cigarettes throughout Ukraine without licenses and quality certificates. The goods were stored in warehouses in the city of Izmail, Avangard village and in apartments in the center of Odesa.

Among the convicts are also a married couple from Odesa who illegally sold cigarettes with counterfeit excise stamps and alcohol through a chain of retail stores in the Peresypskyi district of Odesa.

During the searches, according to the BES, detectives found 1,500 liters of alcohol, 1,750 bottles of alcoholic beverages of unknown origin, barrels and equipment for bottling alcohol, almost 78,000 packs of cigarettes and another 10,000 cigarettes individually. The vehicles used to transport the excisable goods and the draft books were also seized. The total value of the seized inventory is almost UAH 18 million.

In the Odesa seaport, the BES detectives found a container of Marvel cigarettes without excise stamps, ready for export. This is another tax evasion scheme in Odesa ports.

Earlier this year, the BES detectives exposed a group of companies in the field of storage and transshipment of agricultural products that evaded paying UAH 30 million in income tax.

Кирило Бойко