Mykolaiv Court of Appeal is joined by candidates with dubious reputations

The High Qualification Commission of Judges has recommended 16 candidates for the Mykolaiv Court of Appeal, although five of them had negative opinions from the Public Integrity Council. Among the claims are possible concealment of property, undeclared housing, trips to the occupied territories and questionable court decisions.

This was reported by NikCenter.

On May 20, the High Qualification Commission of Judges completed the competition to the Mykolaiv Court of Appeal and recommended 16 candidates out of 21 vacant seats. At the same time, five of the winners of the competition had previously received negative opinions from the Public Integrity Council, which pointed to problems with ethics, declarations, property and behavior of the candidates.

One of the candidates is Volodymyr Bionosenko, a judge of Mykolaiv District Administrative Court. The PIC stated that he may not meet the integrity criteria due to the alleged understatement of the value of his house and land plot in Mykolaiv. In the declaration, the 170-square-meter house was valued at about 681 thousand hryvnias, although the council estimated that the real market price could be about 85 thousand dollars. The judge himself explained the low value of the house by its outdated Soviet style and external condition.

Even more complaints arose against judge Serhiy Hlubochenko of the Vitovsky District Court. The PIC claimed signs of plagiarism in his dissertation and also drew attention to an apartment that the judge had not declared for several years, although he was registered there with his son. The candidate himself explained that they did not actually live there. In addition, the Council analyzed his decisions in cases of drunk driving: the judge closed some proceedings due to the expiration of the time limit, transferred some to labor collectives, and exempted some drivers from liability due to the insignificance of the violation.

The candidacy of Tetyana Kartasheva attracted special attention. The PIC conclusion states that in 2015, the judge and her son traveled to occupied Luhansk through the territory of the Russian Federation, after which her data appeared on the Myrotvorets website. The judge explained that the trip was related to visiting relatives who remained in the occupied territory and emphasized that she did not support Russian aggression. At the same time, the PIC believes that the trip was not critically necessary. The Council also drew attention to numerous violations of the deadlines for consideration of cases over the years. Kartasheva explained the delays by the behavior of the parties to the cases and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Judge Artem Tokarev of the Pokrovsk City District Court of Donetsk Oblast had questions about his asset declarations. The PIC pointed out that his wife's cars could have been declared at a much lower price than the market price. In particular, the BMW in the declaration was valued at 70 thousand hryvnias, although its market value could exceed 700 thousand. The Council also drew attention to information about court decisions being made in the absence of the judge at the workplace, although this was not the main reason for the negative conclusion.

Judge Pavlo Charichansky is accused of a possible conflict of interest. It is a case of alimony, where his assistant was the plaintiff. Despite the claimed recusal due to doubts about his impartiality, the judge independently considered the motion and denied it. The PIC stated that this situation could have created an impression of bias and called into question the impartiality of the court.

The NABU and the SAPO also returned to the case of former Supreme Court Chief Justice Vsevolod Kniazev from Mykolaiv after a pause of almost three years.

Анна Бальчінос