Ruslan Trebushkin: The true story of the werewolf mayor of Pokrovsk. PART 1

Today he dresses up in an embroidered shirt and is actively involved in “Ukrainization,” although in 2014 he brought lard and chocolate to the Berkut officers on Maidan, and then praised Putin (*criminal) for the annexation of Crimea and called for fighting the “illegal Kyiv junta.” However, this is not the only reason why the new-old mayor of Pokrovsk (Krasnoarmeysk) Ruslan Trebushkin is called a werewolf. This active “cutter” of city budgets has had close ties with both the “cops” and the bloodiest bandits of Donbass from a very young age. Apparently that’s why Trebushkin, who regularly gets involved in corruption scandals, always got away with it. And not a single one of the cases brought against him was ever completed…

Dimitrovsky “snitch”

Trebushkin Ruslan Valerievich was born on November 27, 1975 in Donetsk, into a simple working-class family. His mother worked as a crane operator at a mine and raised two sons herself. In 1978, they moved to Dimitrov (renamed Mirnograd in 2016), where his younger brother Alexey was born a year later. Trebushkin lived in this city almost his entire life, making a career from metal collector to mayor. How did he manage to do this? As in most cases of the transformation of domestic Cinderellas from young tramps into businessmen, politicians or “authorities”, he was helped by a lucky chance and good friends.

In Dimitrov they settled in an apartment in the youth quarter, where Ruslan Trebushkin soon had a friend and classmate, Konstantin Prokopov, who lived in a neighboring house. Neighbors and acquaintances characterized these inseparable “homies” as, at best, tomboys. And Ruslan Trebushkin suffered greatly from a lack of expensive and branded things, so from a young age his entire interest in life came down to becoming rich. This dream gradually began to come true in the 90s, when, after graduating from vocational school, Ruslan Trebushkin went into business. More precisely, “like a business”, because, according to sources Skelet.Infothen Trebushkin and Prokopov were “tied up” for the banal theft of some government property, allegedly non-ferrous metal. And both of them would have received at least a suspended sentence if Prokopov’s mother, Tamara Fedorovna, had not tearfully asked for her “little pig” and his friend. After which both guys suddenly became best friends with the police, so much so that Konstantin Prokopov then (apparently after the army) even went to work in the Ministry of Internal Affairs. He is still often called a “former cop,” and perhaps this explains his extreme non-publicity – unlike his childhood friend, who loved to pose for cameras even before being elected mayor.

But Ruslan Trebushkin, who came to his senses with the help of Aunt Tamara and the police, became a legal businessman. This happened in 1994, when at the age of 19 he opened his first company – private enterprise “Ruslan” (in honor of himself), becoming his own director. Apparently, he never repaid his military debt to his homeland: the reason for this may have been that theft incident, and the fact that Trebushkin began working for the police. His first venture was a toilet in the city market, where Ruslan Trebushkin began charging an entrance fee. Whether he reached an agreement with the director of the market, whether curators from the city department put him there, or whether this place “near the bucket” was allocated to him by the local “lads” – this remains unknown.

Soon he had to change his field of activity: times were difficult, people increasingly preferred to go out to relieve themselves before the wind, rather than pay for the entrance to the old toilet, so the “Ruslan” sign had to be moved from the toilet to a recycling collection point located in the same market . And here Ruslan Trebushkin turned around! Over the course of several years, he expanded his business from empty bottles and waste paper to a whole network of metal collection points. And when there was a lot of this metal, Trebushkin rented one of the city’s enterprises for a warehouse.

At the same time, his metal collectors cut and dragged everything to Trebushkin: from children’s swings and sewer hatches to water pipes and mining equipment! But if anyone was punished for this, it was only drunks with hacksaws. Trebushkin’s business was reliably covered by the local police: his old “curator”, his childhood friend who received shoulder straps, and Prokopov’s colleagues – with whom Ruslan quickly became friends.

In general, by the end of the 90s, Trebushkin managed to turn the situation around in his favor, and it was no longer he who worked for the police, but the police who worked for him. Well, perhaps with the exception of very high ranks, among whom they named a certain colonel, who later received a general and became the head of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Kyiv Region. As the media reported, Prokopiv, who left the police in the 2000s and officially went into business, was at one time listed as an adviser to this general. But from whom? No one named a specific name. Well, the role of this patron in general’s uniform was claimed by two heads of the Kyiv regional police who came from the Donetsk region: Anatoly Voloshchuk, who arrived in the capital in 2003 with the first wave of “Donetsk”, and Konstantin Sapko, appointed in 2007, and then in 2010. And if you find a connection between Trebushkin and Prokopov with Voloshchuk Skelet.Info failed, then with Sapko it is obvious and not particularly hidden. In Trebushkin’s declaration it was indicated that his wife Victoria Nikolaevna Trebushkina in 2014 received “for free use” an apartment in Kyiv (110 sq.m.) from a certain Vasily Sapko. Who turned out to be the son of General Sapko, as well as the founder of the hunting society “Yarik”, which in 2012, with the help of his father, acquired 31 thousand hectares of land in the Kyiv region. And General Sapko himself, after his resignation, found himself the position of head of the Security Department of the state company Ukrgasvydobuvannya, where he successfully “sawed” tens of millions government hryvnia on fraudulent tenders for hiring security firms.

In addition to the “cop roof,” Ruslan Trebushkin had and still has extensive connections in the criminal world. It was not for nothing that they said that young Ruslan was assigned by the “cops” to “snitch” on local bandits! Traces of these connections can be found in his business. For example, among the founders of Dondorstroy-Prompostavki LLC (USREOU 24460686), created back in 1998, in addition to the Trebushkin brothers and Konstantin Prokopov, you can also find a certain Gerontius Lepsai, who has the largest share. And a person with the same first and last name, not very common and even, one might say, rare, in the past featured in the media as a member of the bloody organized crime group Givi Nemsadze from the Donetsk region, who is responsible for dozens of murders. Their gang was practically crushed by Russian law enforcement officers in 2006, the detainees were extradited to Ukraine, then the leader himself turned himself in – after which he… acquitted and released. They say that it was not he who allegedly committed the murders, but his long-dead brother! Moreover, it was the then Deputy Prosecutor General Renat Kuzmin himself who asked for Givi, who has now become a public politician from the OPZZH and has not left television screens.

And here is Givi himself (aka Givchik, aka Papa), we find him among the founders of Trebushkin’s other companies: Donvtorresurs LLC (30853260) and Stroymaterialy LLC (06959732), and he also has the largest shares there! But the list of co-founders of the Donetsk sports club “Irbis” (33135414) is especially impressive. In addition to Ruslan Trebushkin, Givi Nemsadze and Gerontius Lepsai, it also includes Anatoly Shikhkerimov (nickname Beast) and Eduard Artouz – we find all these names in the list of participants Nemsadze organized crime group. A very big question arises: how did Ruslan Trebushkin manage to fit into this friendly group of dangerous bandits? If only in the role of a “mole,” then didn’t they really figure him out? Or was he working on two fronts? Looks like there’s still a lot we don’t know about him…

And in Ruslan Trebushkin’s immediate circle there are many heads of local strength sports federations – who, as you know, also often have a criminal past or an equally murky present as suppliers of “titushki”. But among them there is also the former Dimitrov opera Stanislav Mazurak (vice-president of the Mirnograd Boxing Federation), whom The media called head of security Ruslan Trebushkin.

From “Young Regions” to the mayor-utility worker

In 2001, a qualitatively new stage began in the life of Ruslan Trebushkin, raising him to a higher level. Firstly, in his business the main role began to be played not by small points for collecting scrap metal from homeless people and beggars, but by teams that cut out entire enterprises (by agreement with their directors). The volume of scrap increased sharply, and for its further sale Trebushkin created Donmet LLC. It is unknown whether this company had any relation to the autogenous and welding equipment plant of the same name in Kramatorsk. In 2009, Trebushkin liquidated it and hid all the loose ends in the water. But until then, he proudly bore the “title” of its director and even president, taking his friend Prokopov, who had resigned from the police, as vice president.

Secondly, in the same 2001, Trebushkin went into politics, becoming the chairman of the Dimitrov organization of the Union of Youth of the Regions of Ukraine (since 2010 known as “Young Regions”). What’s interesting is this: this youth wing of the Party of Regions was officially registered in 2002, but its prototype appeared precisely in 2001, when, as a result of an agreement between Petro Poroshenko and the Donetsk people, the Party of Regions was formed. That is, Trebushkin was not even a regionalist of the first wave, he participated in the very creation of the party! However, this was a simple matter: then emissaries from Azarov and Rybak traveled throughout the Donbass and campaigned for local “elites” to enroll in their party. Trebushkin was lucky: one of his senior comrades joined the Party of Regions, pulling him along with them. But he would hardly have led the local “young regionals” if he had not had at his disposal certain young people (or “titushki”) who helped the older regionals in the 2002 elections.

It is not appropriate for a “young politician”, even at the level of a small mining town, to be a scrap metal worker with a vocational school certificate in his pocket. Therefore, Trebushkin was helped not only with a new company, but also with obtaining a higher education: in 2001, he enrolled in absentia at the Donetsk State University of Management, where 5 years later he received a master’s degree in finance. According to reviews from Trebushkin’s acquaintances, he never opened a single textbook, in fact, he bought his diploma for “green lard.”

For his zeal in the 2002 election campaign, Trebushkin was taken as an adviser to the new Dimitrovsky mayor, Vitaly Klyuchka. But his first experience in politics was a disaster: in 2005, Klyuchka left his post, and his successor Yuri Anisimov found Trebushkin to be of no special need. Klyuchka himself in 2006 moved to the Donetsk Regional Council on the PR list, in 2007 he became the head of the Main Directorate of the State Treasury in the Donetsk region, but in 2014 he was nominated to the Verkhovna Rada in the 50th district under the banner of the Poroshenko Bloc.

And again, chance helped Trebushkin. In October 2009, a drunken Anisimov hit a woman to deathand although after that he was released on bail and walked free for more than two years before the trial, the chair immediately began to shake under him. The murderer mayor, who aroused the anger of city residents, was very quickly fired by decision of the City Council. After which the acting City Council Secretary Larisa Revva, who was predicted to win the local elections in October 2010, began to act as mayor.

But here Trebushkin developed vigorous activity. First, he grabbed the position of director of the Dimitrovsky Association of Public Utilities (he called himself a “crisis manager”), gaining direct access to budget flows and utility payments. Immediately, a grandiose “cut” began: Trebushkin actively “earned money” not only from the city’s necessary road repairs, street lighting and signs on houses (all through companies associated with him), but also from dubious projects. For example, on the reconstruction of the city fountain and the construction of a motocross track. The latter was directly connected with his friend and companion Konstantin Prokopov, who is the president of the Dimitrov/Mirnograd Motorsports Federation. This is a gift to a childhood friend at the expense of the city!

Then Trebushkin joined the election campaign. At first, he agreed with the leadership of the Party of Regions that it would be he, and not Revva, who would run for the party. As a result, “thrown away by the regionals,” Larisa Nikolaevna left their ranks as a sign of protest and went to the polls under the flags of the opposition “Front of Change.” Which became her key mistake, since Dimitrov’s voters did not favor the “orange”. And in addition to this, Trebukin not only generously showered with promises to turn the city into a garden (without saying how his enterprises were cut into metal, leaving people without work), but also brought up his “young regionals.” Revva received threats and nasty things were written on the gates of her house. That’s how, in the fall of 2010, Trebushkin was elected mayor of Dimitrov.

Now fully in control of the city budget and city property, Trebushkin grabbed them with both hands, like a hysterical supermarket shopper on Black Friday. But taught by the experience of his predecessors and colleagues, Trebushkin preferred not to steal money directly, but to busily “saw” it through tenders. Hence the “great life” he started, which he then began to expand to the adjacent villages. At the same time, this gave him the opportunity for self-PR: they say, look how I raised your city from ruins! True, in half of the cases these repairs resembled Klitschkov’s “damn-it-was”, or as people say, “crap-to-the-top”, that is, the hole in the asphalt was filled with asphalt mixed with garbage, and the rotten part was painted over. But the main thing in this PR was not the facts, but numerous laudatory articles in local and regional pressas well as printed propaganda materials distributed on the streets by Trebushkin’s “young regionals”.

Behind the facade of this PR there remains rampant corruption. For example, in the summer of 2012, Trebushkin assembled a competition commission to identify a contractor for a large investment project for the removal and disposal of household waste. However, according to Trebushkin himself, the competition did not take place. And the commission chose as the contractor the company “Empire-Nefteproduct” registered in Mariupol (USREOU 34752630), whose co-owners are his brother Alexey Trebushkin and his wife Victoria Trebushkina. When this became known to the public, a scandal arose, and then criminal proceedings No. 12015050490000309 were initiated under Article 364-2 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine “abuse of power or official position.”

The investigation dragged on for quite some time, and then died out. Trebushkin put on an innocent face and claimed that there was no corruption here. He didn’t even hesitate to say the following: “The enterprise, the owner of which I was 5 years ago, today our family and my relatives have nothing to do with it. And my brother, against whom investigative actions are being carried out, was never involved in the financial and economic activities of the enterprise, not 5, not 10, not even a year ago. He was only the founder”. It seems that Trebushkin considered not only his voters, but also law enforcement officers to be morons! However, the latter were always “in his pocket”…

Meanwhile, the “cutting” continued, sometimes in the most literal sense. During 2012-2013 Dimitrov’s budget spent 1.429 million hryvnia (178 thousand dollars at the then exchange rate) on tree trimming alone. The work was carried out by the company Ecobud-Service (37803462), which then belonged to city council deputies Alexander Eskin and Alexander Bilichenko. Moreover, they “trimmed” the trees in a barbaric manner, leaving bare poles (many died after this), and huge piles of cut branches lay in the middle of the streets and courtyards for weeks – because Trebushkin had a workshop for the production of pellets, and he needed free ready-made (dried) for it. raw materials, which he received entirely at the expense of the city (the city also paid for the “removal” of branches to the mayor’s workshop). And then he sold these pellets to the city!

Later, having become the mayor of Pokrovsk for the first time, Ruslan Trebushkin launched his “pellet business” there too – for which purpose he specially transferred most of the city’s boiler houses to solid fuel. Moreover, when the trees in Pokrovsk itself began to run out, Trebushkin turned his attention to the forest belts outside the city, deciding to “ennoble” them too. “We’ll remove the dry buildings, trim the trees and provide the city with fuel for 20 years to come.”– he told reportershowever, without admitting that his main goal was to provide himself with profit for 20 years in advance, and again at the expense of the city. By the way, since after such “care” for forest belts they actually cease to fulfill their functions as wind barriers, in this case Trebushkin simply publicly admitted that he had a hand in the desertification of Donbass. Which threatens to make most of this region lifeless by the middle of this century.

Or here: for the repair of roads in Dimitrov during the same period, 5.763 million hryvnia (721 thousand dollars) were allocated, with almost all tenders going to the company Budresurs (32087902). Whose co-founder and co-owner until 2019 was Vyacheslav Khasenko, the uncle of Ruslan Trebushkin’s wife! And the then director of Budresurs, Leonid Kravchenko, according to Skelet.Infois a companion and ally of Alexei Trebushkin. Also, Trebushkin, with the help of his manual commission of the City Council, helped Budservis obtain a contract for the renovation of apartments for beneficiaries at the expense of the city treasury.

Among the companies that regularly received utility and other tenders were also named:
• Private enterprise “Garant-Service” (35191601), owned by Nadezhda Kasyan, mother of Alexander Kasyan, Trebushkin’s then adviser.
• Private enterprise “Dominant-Service” (35457641), controlled by Sergei Fedorov, an old friend of Trebushkin, whom he helped become the mayor of neighboring Rodinsky.
• LLC “Ukr-Art-Land” (33215232), whose founders were the son of the manager of the Dimitrovsky City Council, Natalya Maslova, and the wife of the secretary of the City Council, Alexander Brykalov.
• Donmontazh LLC (30347331). The founder and head of this construction company is Pavel Solodukha, another close friend of Ruslan Trebushkin, at that time a deputy of the Dimitrov City Council and chairman of the commission on housing and communal issues and city improvement.

There would have been much more evidence of Ruslan Trebushkin’s corrupt activities as mayor of Dimitrov, and the amount of budget funds “sawed” by him would have been easy to calculate. However, when journalists and social activists became interested in Trebushkin’s “great everyday life,” he went and… classified the entire accounting department of the City Council. Including the specific volumes of work performed and their estimated cost – so that it is impossible to calculate the amount of overpayments that ended up in the pockets of Trebushkin’s relatives and friends.

Having pretty much cut through the city treasury in the “championship” year of 2012, Ruslan Trebushkin decided to get into the pockets of the townspeople, calling on them… chip in for roof repairs. He suggested that city residents pay half the cost of replacing the soft roof themselves, immediately inflating its cost by one and a half times (at the then market cost of work and materials of about 20 hryvnia per square meter, he asked for 30). Later he pulled off the same trick in Pokrovsk.

Sergey Varis, for Skelet.Info

CONTINUED: Trebushkin Ruslan: The true story of the werewolf mayor of Pokrovsk. PART 2

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