Represented themselves as OVA officials and lured money from citizens allegedly for the Armed Forces of Ukraine: law enforcement officers of Odessa region exposed a group of fraudsters

08.07.2022 18:15

This was announced by the Head of the National Police Igor Klymenko. The attackers are residents of several regions of Ukraine. It is known about at least 15 business entities in which they have lured a total of more than a million hryvnias. Four offenders were detained by the police, and several more are in the temporarily uncontrolled territory of Ukraine and abroad.

Operatives of the Criminal Investigation Department of the GUNP in the Odessa region received information that persons under the pretext of receiving funds for volunteer assistance of the army developed letters signed by the heads of regional military administrations and sent them to entrepreneurs throughout the country.

“In them, business representatives were asked to join in raising funds for the needs of the Armed Forces. The letter contained a bank account number and a contact of one of the OVA officials. Of course, no official has sent such letters. This is the work of a group of fraudsters who forged these documents. The police of the Odessa region quickly went on their trail,” the Head of the National Police said.

The collected information was implemented by law enforcement officers together with investigators of the police department № 1 of the Odessa district police department № 1 of the GUNP in the Odessa region with the support of the Malinovskaya district prosecutor's office of the city of Odessa, employees of the Criminal Investigation Department of the National Police of Ukraine and the Criminal Investigation Offices of Dnipropetrovsk and Ternopil Oblast.

“And it turned out that the same requests for signatures of local heads of OVA were received in 10 more regions of the state. At the moment, at least 100 facts of transferring funds to the accounts indicated in the letters are known. The smallest amount is 10 thousand hryvnias, the largest amount reached 100 thousand hryvnias. But the investigation is actively working, so the number of victims will increase significantly, and the total amount of damage will be determined in millions,” said Igor Klymenko.

The police found that an organized criminal group is involved in the fraudulent scheme, each participant of which is endowed with certain duties: to search for people who, for a monetary reward, would open bank accounts in their names; buy subscriber numbers; activate accounts; communicate with citizens, posing as officials of state administrations; collect money from gullible people; withdraw funds in cash.

“A few words about fraudsters. The group consisted of 7 people. Citizen D., who is located on the territory of the so-called “LPR”, organized them and developed the scheme. From there, he supervised the co-organizers by telephone. The police of the Odessa region detained 4 suspects — residents of the Dnipropetrovsk region, among them — and a 22-year-old co-organizer of the criminal group.”

Today we are talking about at least 15 businessmen deceived by criminals, who in total donated more than a million hryvnias to help the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

To stop the illegal scheme, law enforcement officers simultaneously held 16 sanctioned events in several regions of the country, as a result of which they exposed all its participants and seized material evidence and tools of the crime. In particular, mobile terminals, subscriber numbers, letters on behalf of the heads of military administrations, bank cards and money obtained by criminal means.

These participants of the criminal group were detained in accordance with Article 208 of the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine. The issue of notifying them of suspicion of fraud committed on a large scale (Part 3 of Article 190 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine) and the choice of a precautionary measure is resolved.

Measures are being taken to detain other participants in the crime who are in the temporarily occupied territory of Ukraine and abroad.

For the crimes committed, offenders face punishment in the form of imprisonment for a term of three to eight years.

“Once again, I appeal to citizens: check the information on fundraising so that your money really reaches those in need,” Igor Klymenko stressed.