SBI detains Odesa ex-military commissar Borysov

Employees of the State Bureau of Investigation (SBI) together with prosecutors of the Prosecutor General’s Office detained the former head of the Odesa Regional Territorial Center for Staffing and Social Support. Ukrainian News Agency was informed about this by the SBI.

On Saturday, he was charged with illegal enrichment of hundreds of millions of hryvnias and deliberate evasion of duty. The former official tried to escape from the investigation, at the same time he used elements of the conspiracy - he changed the numbers of telephones, cars, etc., location.

It is reported that active searches lasted for two days and, eventually, as a result of comprehensive operative and investigative measures, he was discovered and detained in Kyiv.

Given the efforts of the former military commissar to hide from justice, the SBI employees will ask the court to keep him in custody without the possibility of making bail.

As noted, during the pretrial investigation, the Bureau collected a huge array of its own evidence base. However, media reports were also studied for a full-fledged and impartial investigation. The materials of the National Agency on Corruption Prevention (NACP), which also revealed signs of illegal enrichment of the former Odesa military commissar for more than UAH 188 million, will also be examined.

In particular, one of the journalistic investigations showed that last year Borysov's mother became the owner of a residential building in Spain worth more than EUR 4 million. It also turned out that, in addition to elite foreign real estate, this year she also bought a Mercedes-Benz EQV car for almost UAH 3 million.

Later, the law enforcement officers established that his mother-in-law had become the owner of an expensive car fleet in recent years, without having sufficient funds of legal origin for this purpose. It included: Toyota Land Cruiser Prado, Mercedes-Benz G 63 AMG, Toyota Land Cruiser.

The ex-military commissar’s wife also purchased another foreign real estate - an office space in Spain worth EUR 737,000, also without having a sufficient amount of legally obtained assets and income for this.

The former military commissar is suspected of:

• acquisition by a person authorized to perform state functions of assets, the value of which exceeds his legal income by more than six thousand five hundred non-taxable minimum incomes of citizens (Article 368-5 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine);
• failure to report for duty on time by a military serviceman without valid reasons, committed under martial law - committing a criminal offense (Part 5 of Article 407 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine);
• the military serviceman's evasion of the duties of military service by deception, committed under martial law (Part 4 of Article 409 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine).

Sanctions of the articles provide for restriction of liberty up to 10 years of imprisonment.

Investigations are ongoing.

In May, employees of the State Bureau of Investigation also began criminal proceedings on the fact of abuse of office by the head of the Odesa Regional Territorial Center for Staffing and Social Support during mobilization activities.

As Ukrainian News Agency earlier reported, previously the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Valerii Zaluzhnyi, appointed brigade commander Colonel Oleksandr Okhrimenko as the head of the Odesa Regional Territorial Center for Staffing and Social Support, instead of the scandalous Yevhen Borysov.