Victory for freedom of speech: appeal sided with the media in the lawsuit by a tax official from the Yanukovych era – Holovach

The judiciary is on the side of the media. The Kyiv Court of Appeal 16 September 2026 ruled to overturn the decision of the Pechersky District Court of Kyiv, which had granted the claim of former head of the tax police under Yanukovych, Andriy Holovach, in case No. 757/23837/19-c for protection of honor, dignity, and business reputation. Information about the case hearing is available on the court’s official website.

The appellate panel composed of A.M. Stryzheus (presiding judge-rapporteur), O.I. Shkorina and L.D. Polyvach (judges) issued a new decision – Holovach’s claim was fully dismissed.

Andriy Holovach is the former head of the tax police who, during Yanukovych’s time, was involved in a criminal case about the embezzlement of over 3 billion hryvnias of budget funds in VAT refund schemes and was even detained in 2016, but later secured the closure of that case, as StopCor and other media repeatedly reported.

According to the investigation by "Stop Corruption TV," Holovach’s family and close associates are likely to control a number of valuable business assets, which may include several floors in the capital’s Arena-City business center and an elite cottage community near Kyiv.

It was precisely media publications and comments about the official’s wealth and past that prompted Holovach’s lawsuit seeking protection of his honor, dignity, and business reputation against well-known journalist Roman Bochkala and other defendants.

How did the trial proceed and what did the first instance decide?

Proceedings in the case were opened back in January 2021 by Pechersky District Court judge Iryna Hryhorenko. Holovach’s claim concerned statements made during an interview with businessman Oleg Averyanov on one of the TV channels, as well as a comment by journalist Roman Bochkala. The plaintiff stated that he considered these statements to be false and to violate his honor, dignity and business reputation.

The case, which StopCor covered, was heard for many months, and, according to media observations, Holovach himself systematically failed to appear at hearings, which repeatedly prompted defense motions to dismiss the claim for non-prosecution. Nevertheless, hearings were repeatedly postponed to later dates.

Commenting on the situation in December 2024, journalist Roman Bochkala noted:

"The courts are now in play. So, the former head of the tax police, Andriy Holovach, who under the regionals collected tribute in the form of business percentages from Ukrainian enterprises, filed a suit against me and a number of media outlets in the ‘most humane in the world’ Pechersky District Court seeking protection of his honor, dignity, and business reputation. Over four years of proceedings in this case, Holovach himself did not appear at a single hearing – apparently understanding the groundlessness and hopelessness of his claims," he emphasized.

One piece of evidence in the case was a video recording of the interview on a disc. However, according to available information, during the hearing the video file on the disc… did not open – the court was able to play only the audio track. How reliably, under such conditions, the court could attribute a voice to a specific person is a question that evidently became one of the grounds for the appeal.

Nevertheless, on 9 December 2024 the Pechersky District Court ruled in favor of Holovach, finding Averyanov’s statements and Bochkala’s comment to be false and to have violated his honor and dignity. The defendants filed appeals against that ruling – as recorded in the case materials, the appellate proceedings were opened in October 2025, and the case was assigned to the panel of judges of the Kyiv Court of Appeal consisting of rapporteur judge Andriy Stryzheus, Olga Shkorina and Lyudmyla Polyvach.

What did the appellate court decide?

The key hearing in the case took place on 16 September 2026, when the appellate court examined the appeals on the merits. The court heard the defendants’ appeals.

The defendants argued that the trial court committed significant violations of procedural law, that the interview does not contain factual assertions about the plaintiff, and that it fully conforms to journalistic ethics.

In addition, the defendants pointed out that Holovach, as a former high-ranking official, is a public figure, and therefore the permissible degree of criticism toward him is broader than for an ordinary citizen – a principle consistently applied by the European Court of Human Rights in freedom of expression cases.

Plaintiff’s representative Maksym Kolosar opposed the granting of the appeals, insisting that, in his view, the trial court’s decision was lawful, reasoned, and should not be overturned.

After hearing the parties and examining the case materials, the panel of judges, following deliberation, adopted a decision: to satisfy the appeals of Averyanov and Bochkala, to overturn the decision of the Pechersky District Court of Kyiv dated 9 December 2024, and to issue a new decision – to deny Andriy Holovach’s claim.

What’s next?

The appellate court’s decision takes legal effect immediately upon its announcement, but it can be appealed to the cassation court within 30 days. Whether Andriy Holovach will use this right and whether the case will reach the Supreme Court is currently unknown.

At the same time, this concerns only the first of three of Holovach’s lawsuits against media figures – two other similar cases are reportedly being heard in the Obolonsky District Court of Kyiv. So it is too early to put a final point on this legal confrontation.

Recall that investigative journalists of the online media outlet "Stop Corruption TV" have already highlighted the assets and business ties of former tax official Andriy Holovach’s family: preliminary data indicate that he may have unofficially controlled a share of the capital’s Arena City business center and the Smilianska Khlodnya factory in Cherkasy region, and that persons close to him may have taken over an elite cottage community near Kyiv.