Ukrainian Interior Minister Arsen Avakov said that law enforcement carried a large-scale series of arrest and searches to detain the members of organized criminal group in Zatoka, a resort in Odesa Oblast at the south of Ukraine.
Avakov said on Dec. 10 that more than 300 national police officers and investigators from General Prosecutor’s Office and Security Service of Ukraine conducted searches and detention of alleged criminal group’s members, who demanded a € 50 million bribe from Estonian investor.
Avakov said that SBU arrested six members of the same criminal group in May, including the head of the village council, and charged them with an attempt of murder.
Former head of national police Khatia Dekanoidze said at the press conference on Sept. 14 that police imitated a murder of civic activist and lawyer Oleksandr Pogorilyi to detain the criminal group who intended to kill him.
According to various news reports, Pogorilyi received murder threats after he publicly accused Zatoka officials in land embezzlement and blackmailing of Estonian billionaire Marcel Wichmann.
In September, police detained ex-secretary of Zatoka village council Vyacheslav Bokiy, who was accused of leading a criminal group engaged in land seizures and assassinations.
Avakov said that since the detention in May, law enforcement continued investigation to “expose not only the individual tentacles, but the whole criminal structure and its leaders.”
According to Avakov, the criminal group included local officials, judges, police officers, local prosecutors and SBU officers.
Avakov said that police registered 50 criminal proceedings, such as attempt of murder and blackmailing, setting fire at recreation centers to redistribute of land under them and direct extortion.
Avakov also said that police will investigate the fraud schemes at local elections that “allowed the members of criminal group to come to power.”
He said that one of the schemes included registering several hundred people in a single apartment before elections, so they could vote in favour of certain candidates. Avakov said that sometimes around 700 people were registered in one apartment. He added that on the contrast, there were only 1,300 people who could vote in Zatoka.
