In Kharkiv region, law enforcement officers conducted a special operation to detain a gang of “black realtors”
The participants of the criminal organization found lonely or poorly protected persons among the residents of the Kharkiv region, deprived them of their freedom, carried out illegal possession of their real estate on the basis of forged documents, and then liquidated their victims. Internal security officers, detectives of the police investigative department and the prosecutor's office of the Kharkiv region have already handed over suspicions to eight defendants.
Employees of the Kharkiv Division of the Department of Internal Security of the National Police of Ukraine and detectives of the Kharkiv Police Investigative Department established that in early 2019 a group of persons was organized in Kharkiv for the purpose of illegal enrichment. The leader of the group is a local resident, born in 1984. Among his accomplices are five men and three women.
Searching for lonely people or those who found themselves in difficult life circumstances, intruders chose an individual way to take possession of their real estate. Some of their victims were plied with alcoholic beverages, some had their housing documents stolen, others were illegally deprived of their liberty and detained by force. But the result was always the same: on the basis of forged documents, the apartments of the victims passed into someone else's property, the funds from the sale of real estate were deposited in the accounts of the members of the criminal group, and the victims themselves were found dead.
Here are some of the exposed episodes of criminal activity of the defendants:
- the person died, and after her death a contract of sale of housing was drawn up; - the body of another person, whom the accomplices had been sweating for a long time, was found near the reservoir;
- another man was deceived from the apartment to a house in the village, where they were kept and added to an alcoholic
substance that was supposed to provoke cardiac arrest. At present, after the exhumation of the body, a forensic medical examination is carried out to establish the cause of death;
- the apartment of the Kharkiv woman was sold according to false documents, the woman was held against her will on the territory of the household, where later she was beaten, strangled and buried in the backyard.
The same participation awaited two more people, whose property the defendants had already managed to re-register, and the prisoners themselves were kept in a private house.
Law enforcement officers established that the gang of “black realtors” was assisted by an employee of one of the departments of the Kharkiv police.
According to the collected materials, the detectives of the SU GUNP in the Kharkiv region initiated criminal proceedings on the facts of creation and participation in a criminal organization, fraud on a particularly large scale, the use of knowingly forged documents and premeditated murder committed with special cruelty for selfish motives as part of a criminal organization.
In order to eliminate the activities of the exposed group, a special operation was carried out on the territory of Kharkiv region. Employees of the Department of Internal Security of the NPU, the GUNP and the Prosecutor's Office of the Kharkiv region, with the forceful support of the fighters of the Department of Rapid Response of the Air Force, the special unit KORD and the special purpose police company “EAST”, detained two co-organizers and six members of the criminal group.
Almost 40 searches were carried out. During the sanctioned activities, weapons, cash, a large number of documents, mobile phones and cars were seized. And most importantly, the persons who were detained by the attackers of the security forces have been identified and rescued. Their data, places of residence and the circumstances in which they were in captivity are established.
Under the procedural guidance of the regional prosecutor's office, the detectives of the investigative department of the Kharkiv police handed over suspicions to the defendants, who were detained in accordance with Art. 208 of the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine. In the near future, the court will choose preventive measures for them. The 35-year-old police officer involved will also be given the final legal qualification for the actions. If proven guilty, the detainee faces up to 15 years in prison or life imprisonment.
Department of Internal Security of the National Police of Ukraine
