Case description
On April 8, 2024, the HACC sentenced Dmytro Manchulenko, former Director of the Chernivtsi Perinatal Center, for attempting to bribe Regional Council officials to keep his job. Manchulenko was sentenced to a 6-year prison term.
According to the investigation, in the spring of 2021, Manchulenko was caught trying to bribe officials of the Chernivtsi Regional Council. For USD 12,000 (or, as the defendant himself put it, “for 12 kilograms”), of which USD 2,000 was to be paid to the intermediary and USD 10,000 to the Chair of the Chernivtsi Regional Council, the latter was to appoint him for an indefinite period of time as the CEO of MNCE Chernivtsi Regional Perinatal Center, a reorganized maternity hospital.
Manchulenko's history of cooperation with this institution had been long: since 2017, he had been repeatedly fired, in particular for improper performance of duties, but he was reinstated through the courts, and in addition, received compensation for forced absenteeism totaling more than UAH 1.5 million. In addition, despite the conflict of interest, Manchulenko decided to increase the salary of his son, who was the Chief of the Maternity Ward, by 40%, which is qualified as a corruption-related offense.
Manchulenko was detained red-handed after the transfer of the bribe.
During the court hearings, Manchulenko claimed that he had been provoked by law enforcement agencies and that the rules of jurisdiction had been violated. The HACC took these arguments critically.
He was charged with Article 369(4) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine and sentenced to 6 years in prison in 3 years. The court also applied a special confiscation to the funds that were the subject of the crime and recovered USD 12,000 into the national income.
