Evgeny Chernyak. “Vodka king” of all Ukraine

There is a businessman in Zaporozhye who has been trying to take control of the entire city for a long time, and at times was even close to this. His name is Evgeniy Chernyak, in business circles he is known as the “vodka” millionaire who created the Khortytsya trademark, as well as the founder of the notorious Patriot Zaporozhye charitable foundation. He is also the head of the supervisory board of the Odessa Cognac Factory, and the head of the board of the company TD Megapolis. He himself denies in every possible way any facts of participation in big “political games”, but his past tells us something completely different…

Evgeny Chernyak. “Who is this?”

Was born Chernyak Evgeniy Alexandrovich in April 1969 in Zaporozhye. He received his higher education at the Faculty of Machinery and Smelting Technologies at the Zaporozhye Mechanical Engineering Institute. From 1987 to 1989 he served in the ranks of the Soviet Army in the Odessa region. Later, Chernyak received 2 more higher educations: “Law Specialist” at the Interregional Academy of Personnel Management, and a specialty in “Finance” at Zaporozhye National University. Evgeniy Aleksandrovich began taking his first business steps while still a student.

His first business was opening a trading stall. Just a month after the start of work, he brought Chernyak more than 1 thousand dollars. By 1992, he already had 17 stalls, which consistently brought in quite a lot of money. Having accumulated a sufficient amount, Chernyak and his partner opened a wholesale company. It was from this moment that the intensive development of his business began.

In 1998, Evgeny Chernyak initiated the creation of the Megapolis trading house. He managed to convince several private entrepreneurs to join forces and create a large distribution company. “Megapolis” helped Chernyak earn his first million, however, he did not intend to stop there. He worked as CEO of Megapolis until 2002. The following year, he built a large distillery in Zaporozhye, which subsequently began producing vodka under the Khortytsya brand. The next round of business development for Evgeniy Chernyak was the merger of the Khortitsa plant, Odessa Cognac Factory and the Megapolis trading house into the Global Spirits holding. Today, Chernyak controls about 25% of the entire “alcohol business” in Ukraine. According to the Forbes rating, back in 2013, the price of his financial assets was $350 million.

“Criminal Friends”

According to the ancient saying, to understand who you are, you need to know who your friends are. It’s no secret that the “vodka king” Evgeny Chernyak is used to being “friends” only with those people who can help him or his business in some way. Your business path, according to Skelet.Info, he started in difficult times, immediately after the collapse of the USSR. In order to protect his business and not lose everything, he had to look for patrons in the criminal world, contacting whom once, you remain in their debt forever.

One of Chernyak’s guides into the world of crime was Valery Barannikov, a well-known repeat offender with considerable experience. He had already been in prison three times, and each time he ended up there for drug use, beating a police officer, and using violence. Another criminal comrade of Chernyak is the leader of the organized criminal group “Armenians” in the Zaporozhye region Artashes Sargsyan. In turn, he is closely associated with thieves in law “Kamo”, “Samvel-Kharkovsky” and “Armen-Kanevsky”. According to media reports, Chernyak first used the Artashes organized crime group for his own purposes in 2002 for the raider seizure of the Zaporozhye Mechanical Plant.

Evgeny Chernyak and the “Clan of Patriots”

In 2008, Evgeniy Chernyak began creating the Patriot of Zaporozhye charitable foundation. Under his banners, he gathered the largest business representatives in the Zaporozhye region. In addition to Chernyak, the fund was headed by Vladimir Alshan (owner of the largest construction business in Zaporozhye), as well as Boris Shestopalov (owner of the Zaporozhye “bread business”). According to Evgeniy Alexandrovich’s idea, the charitable foundation was supposed to help its members achieve solid PR. And then, on the wave of this “glory,” it will grow into the political bloc “Patriot of Zaporozhye,” which will become an absolute majority in the city council. If this happened, then Chernyak and his company would have the reins of managing the budget of the entire city, as well as the opportunity to “distribute” government contracts to “their” companies.

In order to achieve his goal, Evgeniy Alexandrovich decided to team up with the then mayor of Zaporozhye, Evgeniy Kartashov. Their joint project, as planned, was supposed to gain a majority in the Zaporozhye city council.

According to the publication CENSOR.NO:

Evgeny Chernyak. “Vodka king” of all Ukraine

Despite Chernyak’s generous offer, Kartashov refused to join the “patriots”. A year later, he paid for it, because Evgeniy Aleksandrovich, having united with his opponents, began a large-scale and rather aggressive black PR campaign against Kartashov in all the Zaporozhye media under their control.

It should be noted here that he had very solid support from the media. In addition to Chernyak’s private media, the so-called “media empire” of “Patriot of Zaporozhye” included the newspaper “Freedom Island”. After that, the publication “Mriya” by Boris Shestopalov also joined it. And after Valery Fomenko joined the “patriots,” Komsomolskaya Pravda and Telenedelya also came under Chernyak’s control. A little later, the “Political Council” website was purchased and control over the “Reporter” website was obtained. The Zaporozhye newspaper Iskra also joined them, and its editor-in-chief Artem Timchenko became the main “information fighter” in the battle with Mayor Kartashov. With the hands of Timchenko, Chernyak also waged an information war against the head of the Zaporozhye region police, Vladimir Serba. The saddest thing was that, having gone through fire and water with Chernyak, Timchenko found himself “thrown into the trash heap.” And Evgeniy Aleksandrovich himself began to call him a schizophrenic who did everything on his own initiative. There was also a raider seizure of the TV-5 channel, owned by the Zaporizhstal plant. The famous “crazy” raider Maxim Drozdenko volunteered to help Chernyak capture it. It was he who launched a straightforward and arrogant attack on TV-5. He failed to take over the channel, and Chernyaka very quickly disowned any connections with Drozdenko, and even criticized his activities on air. This is such a “good” and “faithful” comrade, this Mr. Chernyak.

Maxim Drozdenko

Membership in the Patriot of Zaporozhye fund was a very profitable investment, because for only 20 thousand UAH per month (the amount of the contribution to the fund) you could get comprehensive protection from influential patrons, and on top of that, protection from law enforcement agencies, at least That’s what Evgeniy Alexandrovich said. But in reality everything turned out to be completely different. Instead of receiving protection, members of the foundation received the “Chernyakovsky brand.” Despite all the assurances they received, they did not receive the promised protection.

It should be noted here that Chernyak lured many people into his fund using tricks. Boris Shestopalov, for example, came under his control due to the fact that Chernyak helped him in difficult times, when a wave of protests arose against him due to high prices for the products of his bakeries. Then Evgeniy Alexandrovich appeared on a white horse and pulled him out of his problems. A little later it turned out that Chernyak himself created these problems for Shestopalov. He generally liked to put people in a position where they owed him for their friendship. In Zaporozhye, he imagined himself as “Don Corleone,” who, having done you a favor, sooner or later will also ask you for a favor. True, the character of “The Godfather” had the highest moral qualities, unlike the “vodka king” Chernyak.

Another “abandoned” fellow patriot was Vladimir Alshan, the former owner of the large construction company Constanta. The financial crisis forced him to undertake a joint project with Chernyak. Under his own responsibility, he took out a loan for the construction of a large real estate project. Evgeniy Aleksandrovich, in turn, promised to give Alshan a plot of land that he bought in Yalta. In exchange, they only asked to act as a guarantor for a loan of $8.5 million and to draw up a “fake” contract for the construction of a cottage. However, after unforeseen problems arose, he had to blame Alshan and issue an invoice for the entire amount of the loan taken. It turned out that the Non-Ferrous Alloys Plant, controlled by the Chernyakov family, became bankrupt and stopped paying the loan, and the obligations for its payment fell on Vladimir Alshan and his companies. In court, a false contract for the construction of a cottage was revealed and he also had to pay Chernyak compensation in the amount of 16 million UAH. As a result of doing business with Evgeniy Aleksandrovich, Alshan’s construction company “Constant” was destroyed, and clients who invested in the construction of houses were left without anything.

Evgeny Chernyak. “Vodka king” of all Ukraine

“Shameful fight in the club”

At the end of November 2011, Evgeniy Chernyak was beaten in the Zaporozhye bowling club “Capitalist”. According to eyewitnesses, the “vodka king” was rude to one of the visitors and insulted his girlfriend. After friends of the offended people started a fight, demanding an apology from Chernyak, he grabbed a traumatic pistol from his guard and shot one of the attackers in the chest.

Video recordings from surveillance cameras were carefully hidden for a long time, however, over time Skelet.Info I managed to get them.

Video of Chernyak’s beating and escape from a nightclub:

During the formation of his business, Evgeny Chernyak repeatedly found himself in “awkward”, moreover, illegal situations, but his natural resourcefulness and lack of any moral principles helped him not only save his business, but also develop it into a huge “alcohol” empire. And while his former partners, at best, are counting pennies, and at worst, resting on prison bunks, he rests with peace of mind with his entire large family abroad. As he himself stated, he “settled” all the problems with the law, however, to this day a number of proceedings have been opened against his people, a fine was imposed on the Megapolis trading house, and many other unpleasant factors. So, he may have “settled” his legal problems for himself, but people loyal to him and his companies are still in danger.

Dmitry Samofalov, for Skelet.Info

Subscribe to our channels at Telegram, Facebook, CONT, VK And YandexZen – Only dossiers, biographies and incriminating evidence on Ukrainian officials, businessmen, politicians from the section CRYPT!