Case description
On August 3, 2023, the HACC convicted Serhii Shevchenko, former head of the patronage service of the Kirovohrad Regional State Administration, who was an accomplice in extorting a bribe from Ihor Boichuk, head of the regional department of the State Service of Ukraine for Food Safety and Consumer Protection.
In the spring of 2020, Andrii Balon, former head of the Kirovohrad Regional State Administration, had the idea to extort a bribe from Ihor Boichuk, head of the Main Department of the State Food and Consumer Service in the Kirovohrad region, to keep him in office. To do this, he decided to involve his employee, Serhii Shevchenko, head of the patronage service of the Regional State Administration. The latter followed all the instructions and demanded that Boichuk pay UAH 110,000 per month, and in case of refusal, he hinted at various interferences in his work.
Later, the criminals raised their demands to 15% of the total turnover of the public institutions subordinated to the State Service of Ukraine for Food Safety and Consumer Protection in the region. Given the figures for the previous periods, it was about UAH 1.8 million. The first tranche of UAH 100,000 was transferred in early June 2020. After receiving the second tranche of UAH 250,000, the head and the official of the Regional State Administration were detained in the course of a joint operation by the NABU, the SAPO, and the SSU.
The court qualified Shevchenko's actions under Article 27, part 5, Article 368, part 3 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine. He concluded a plea agreement, so he got a 5-year suspended sentence with a 3-year probationary period. In addition, UAH 3.5 million of the bail was transferred to the needs of the Armed Forces, and Shevchenko himself promised to transfer another UAH 2.5 million.
