The country is mired in debt, is on the verge of complete default, and corruption is creeping not only through its doors, but also through its windows, but the “old-new” authorities in the offices of the GPU, instead of working for the good of the country, are busy settling scores.
So what if today prosecutors shelve high-profile cases of corrupt officials, the Maidan cases are not being investigated – the leadership of the GPU is busy with internecine wars and revenge for old grievances. Viktor Shokin in this regard is not far behind his fellow namesake Viktor Pshonka. While Renat Kuzmin (Read more about him in the article Renat Kuzmin: family business of lawless prosecutors) leaks dirt on Prosecutor General Shokin, his colleagues, politicians – Yuri Lutsenko and Leonid Kuchma, the head of the GPU continues to monotonously “stitch” his case. It’s sad, but behind all these “battles of prosecutorial heavyweights,” hands don’t get to cases that are really important to the public.
Another “murka” from Kuzmin for Shokin
After a February complaint to the European Court about unlawful prosecution, former First Deputy Prosecutor General Viktor Pshonka Renat Kuzmin decided to break his two-month silence and wrote a letter to Viktor Shokin on 17 pages. In his “treatise” he exposes, accuses, and demands. In general, there are a lot of words, but the essence is the same – Kuzmin is trying to play Chopin’s funeral march for Shokin and his retinue instead of “Murka”.
What is Kuzmin yelling about? The faithful representative of the escaped Prosecutor General states that Shokin is also a corrupt official who is involved in illegal actions in the investigation of the “Gongadze case.” (And by the way, there is reason to believe him in this, because he never brought the case of murdering a journalist entrusted to Shokin to its logical conclusion).
In addition, Kuzmin accuses the current Prosecutor General, and with him the People’s Deputy Yuriy Lutsenko and his patron Petro Poroshenko, of falsifying materials in the case of Boris Kolesnikov. Kuzmin openly criticizes the underinvestigation of Maidan cases and notes that instead of working on high-profile cases, Shokin is only engaged in settling personal scores.
He did not forget to remember Leonid Kuchma. He expertly, like a prosecutor, once again implicates him in the murder of Gongadze. The “prosecutor in exile” also remembered the $1 billion that Kuchma allegedly paid so that his name would no longer appear in the journalist’s murder case. According to Kuzmin, the new government, by sending Kuchma today as a peacemaker to negotiations with separatists from the DPR and LPR, is simply trying to whiten his reputation (although what kind of reputation we are talking about is not even worth worrying about).
In his “treatise” to Shokin, Renat Kuzmin also mentions the alleged extortion of the then NSDC Secretary Petro Poroshenko of $2 billion from Boris Kolesnikov.
Separately, he addresses the figure of the former investigator of the Prosecutor General’s Office for particularly important cases, Sergei Voichenko, whose arrest was sanctioned by Yuriy Lutsenko.
By the way, it was Voichenko and Kuzmin who were involved in Lutsenko’s case from 2009 to 2011 and “helped” him go to jail. Today, the “defendant” took on his “judges” – the prosecutors.
Therefore, it is not surprising that the GPU is now “shaking” its former employees precisely at the request of ex-minister Lutsenko.
In the letter, Kuzmin says that the prosecutor’s office is illegally prosecuting Voichenko and believes that their cases should be combined, because the investigator’s case is characterized by the same political persecution as his own.
Pshonka’s ex-deputy did not mention the figure of the former lawyer Boris Kolesnikov, and today Kuzmin’s defender, known for his high-profile cases of Andrei Fedur. The ex-prosecutor talks about the facts of preventing Fedur from accessing the materials of Voichenko’s case, the pressure on him from the prosecutor’s office, as well as the suspicion of a crime brought against him.
Thus, in early April, the prosecutor’s office suspected the lawyer of threats and interference in the personal life of prosecutor Tishchenko. Fedur is charged with violating Art. 345 (threat or violence against a law enforcement officer) and Art. 343 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (interference in the activities of a law enforcement officer). The suspicion raised and handed to the lawyer was signed by Shokin’s first deputy, Vladimir Guzyr. Fedur himself calls the accusation ridiculous and states that the suspicion brought is nothing more than pressure on him because of his work on the case of Kuzmin and Voichenko.
In his letter, the former first “deputy” prosecutor general gives the names of many victims and many executioners.
Is Kuzmin’s case closed?
According to Yuriy Lutsenko, Kuzmin is accused of instigating a judge to make a deliberately unjust decision in the case of the former Minister of Internal Affairs. Thus, allegedly “thanks to” Kuzmina, Lutsenko was sentenced to 4 years in prison with confiscation for embezzling budget funds in conspiracy with his former driver Leonid Pristuplyuk, and for embezzlement on the celebration of Police Day in 2008 and 2009, which caused damage to the state. Fedur calls the accusations against his client at least unfounded, because in fact, no court decision was made against Lutsenko and the ex-minister was only a suspect in a corruption case, and as a result was released from arrest.
As Fedur notes, today’s attempts to punish Kuzmin are just an attempt by Shokin to justify himself to the boss of the party coalition, Petro Poroshenko, for failing to immediately get Lutsenko out at the time. Kuzmin himself notes that Alexey Baganets was the first to dig for it. According to him, the then “deputy” prosecutor general also curried favor, but only in front of his former client Lutsenko, whose case as a lawyer at one time he successfully failed.
Both Fedur and Kuzmin assure that this case is connected with the “long tongue” of the former first deputy prosecutor general, because he not only harshly criticizes the work of the GPU, but also accuses it of inactivity, including in the investigation of the shootings on the Maidan and the “Gongadze case” .
But, despite all the arguments of the lawyer and the accused, Shokin said that the former first “deputy” prosecutor general would definitely be charged with abuse of power.
It’s just that things haven’t gotten to the specifics yet. And here is another question: will the GPU be able to collect enough evidence of Kuzmin’s guilt, since so far it has not even been possible to provide facts for Interpol to put the ex-prosecutor on the international wanted list.
The Silence of the Lamb Kuzmina
Almost five years have passed since the secretary of the Prosecutor General’s Office during Pshonka’s time, Yuriy Boychenko, announced the closure of the Gongadze case due to the death of the man who ordered the crime (Yuriy Kravchenko).
All this time, Kuzmin stubbornly remained silent about possible defendants in the case, just as he remained silent about the falsification of the case against Kolesnikov.
The fact is that Lutsenko complained about Kuzmin’s allegedly unlawful actions back at the end of 2012. But they only got down to business “seriously” last year.
Thus, in 2012, GPU investigators conducted an investigation into Lutsenko’s application and eventually closed the criminal proceedings they had opened against Kuzmin. The appeals court also rejected all of Lutsenko’s complaints. But in May 2014, after the change of power, the GPU again opened a case about the illegal arrest of Lutsenko, which Baganets took up. It was after this that sharp criticism of the authorities poured out from Kuzmin’s mouth.
As a result, what we have: when the top of the GPU decided to take revenge on their “preceders”, they received, so to speak, compromising evidence on the forehead and all these unsightly matters might well not have come to light if Kuzmin had not been touched further.
In turn, Viktor Shokin assures that there is no revenge or political persecution in the actions of the GPU, but does not deny that his subordinates are involved in both the Kuzmin case and the case of Viktor Pshonka. Shokin promises that both will be charged with giving criminal orders and abuse of power, first of all this will affect the cases of Tymoshenko and Lutsenko.
Isn’t this revenge? – We ask ourselves a question. After all, besides these cases, the defendants have something else to present, but there are simply no other claims from the GPU. So, whatever one may say, the settling of scores is obvious, on both sides.
But Ukraine is a country of change, the government here changes like the direction of a weather vane in windy weather: today there are some at the helm, and tomorrow they will be replaced by others who, with the same joy and inspiration, will judge their predecessors, give them demonstrative floggings and lead them to jail.
In this regard, Procurator Pravda had several questions:
– why did Renat Kuzmin speak today? Is there really an atmosphere in the GPU that is conducive to the triumph of justice and retribution?
– who else is the former First Deputy Prosecutor General ready to hand over with his “guts” so that there are no complaints against him?
– isn’t Viktor Shokin afraid that the time will come when he will be judged in the same way as Pshonka and Kuzmina? Or maybe the Prosecutor General has already stored a folder of incriminating evidence for all possible judges in advance?
– will the case of Gongadze and the murders on the Maidan, which the top authorities so like to blame on each other, be investigated?