Case description
On July 24, 2020, the HACC found lawyer Oleksii Bozhenok and ex-investigator of the prosecutor's office in Kyiv Oblast Oleksandr Pavlenko guilty of receiving USD 50,000 for influencing the prosecutor's decision to change the qualification of the suspicion notice to Mykola Ilnytskyi. Both were sentenced to 3 and 4 years in prison, respectively.
In 2016, Pavlenko and Bozhenok demanded and received a bribe in the amount of USD 50,000 from Mykola Ilnytskyi, who was promised a change in the charges in his case.
Ilnytskyi, in turn, wanted to receive a bribe from the head of the Holosiivskyi Court; he promised the latter a positive recommendation from the HQCJ in a competition for the head of the local court for USD 30,000 and that the Verkhovna Rada would vote for his appointment as a judge permanently. Ilnytskyi was caught red-handed right on Bankova Street, near the Presidential Office.
So Pavlenko promised Ilnytskyi to change the qualification of the crime from fraud to abuse of influence, having previously colluded with employees of the prosecutor's office of Kyiv Oblast. Bozhenok appeared in this scheme later as an intermediary (an agreement was concluded with the lawyer to hide the fact of a bribe); on December 26, 2016, he received the full amount of the bribe from Ilnytskyi.
Ilnytskyi himself appealed to the NABU, despite the promises of Pavlenko and Bozhenok to resolve his issue. The NABU and the SAPO opened an investigation in this case, and in April 2017, an indictment was referred to the Podilskyi Court of Kyiv.
Subsequently, the case was transferred to the HACC, which sentenced Bozhenok to 3 years in prison, and Pavlenko to 4. Both were banned from holding certain positions for two years. The case was qualified under Article 369-2, part 2 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.
According to the results of the appeal consideration, the HACC Appeals Chamber slightly changed the punishment of the defendants. Pavlenko's punishment was reduced to 2 years, and Bozhenok's additional punishment was changed: he was banned from holding positions only in the bar.
The Supreme Court did not change the punishment, leaving in force the decisions of both instances of the court.
Interestingly, the local courts released the lawyer from prison early. Bozhenok was released a year and a half earlier because he “did not recommend himself in a negative way”; instead of the rest of the term, he was assigned community work.
