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Automatically translated version. May contain inaccuracies compared to the original.
ZN.UA investigated why, after 300 million UAH of bail was not paid, the prosecution did not ask the court to place Stoliar in custody. The reason turned out to be broader than a single case.
In September, the High Anti-Corruption Court chose a preventive measure for Member of Parliament Vadym Stoliar, a subject of NABU and SAP investigations “Femida” and “Forrest Gump,” in the form of 300 million UAH bail without taking him into custody. 11
Under the Criminal Procedure Code, a suspect who is not in custody must pay the bail or ensure its payment by a surety no later than five days from the date the preventive measure is imposed. It can be paid later if by that time the court has not changed the preventive measure.
Stoliar did not pay the bail within the prescribed period, but NABU and the SAP did not petition the HACC to change his preventive measure to detention. ZN.UA asked sources in law enforcement why the prosecution is not demanding the MP’s arrest.
As ZN.UA found out, Stoliar informed the prosecution that he has the necessary funds and is ready to pay the full amount, but banks refuse to process the payments. According to ZN.UA’s interlocutors, refusals come from banks’ financial monitoring units, which classify the funds intended for payment of bail to the HACC account as risky. In some cases banks also terminate their banking service agreements with Stoliar.
According to sources, Stoliar offered the prosecution as an alternative to seize 300 million UAH in his accounts. In private conversations, bank representatives, according to ZN.UA’s interlocutors, explain the refusals by saying that the National Bank, as the central regulator, did not recommend processing payments related to bail in these cases.
This is the reason sources give for why the prosecution does not go to court to request Stoliar’s detention. If the SAP files the corresponding motion, Stoliar will be able to provide the court with documents about attempts to pay the bail and the banks’ refusals.
“If the SAP goes to court, Stoliar will provide documents showing that he contacted the banks and they refused to process the payment or terminated their banking service agreements. Under such circumstances the court will not place him in custody,” a law enforcement source told ZN.UA.
A similar problem, according to ZN.UA sources, arose with the bail for another subject of these investigations — former Deputy Head of the Office of the President Iryna Mudra. In August, the HACC placed her in custody for 60 days with the possibility of release after payment of 20 million UAH bail, and in September the HACC Appeals Chamber left that decision unchanged. 25 2
According to ZN.UA’s sources, Mudra managed to pay 5 million UAH of her own funds, after which her accounts were frozen. Her husband tried to pay the rest, but banks refused to process the payments. They attempted to pay the bail through several banks: lawyers even checked the possibility of making payments in amounts as small as one thousand hryvnias, but banks did not accept even those amounts.
As in Stoliar’s case, refusals came from financial monitoring units. In private conversations, bank representatives, according to ZN.UA’s sources, cited a recommendation from the central regulator not to process such payments to the HACC account.
As a result, Mudra remains in custody, although the court provided for her release after the bail was paid. In other words, the court-designated alternative to detention cannot effectively be implemented because it is impossible to execute the bank payment.
ZN.UA’s interlocutors emphasize that the problem is not financial monitoring itself: the system created in Ukraine makes it possible to verify the origin of funds. In their view, instances in which funds of dubious origin passed control were not due to a lack of necessary mechanisms but due to manual interference in their operation.
Now, sources believe, the opposite extreme has arisen: instead of checking the origin of specific funds, the very possibility of paying bail is being blocked. Legislation allows banks to refuse suspicious financial transactions and to stop them according to a defined procedure. At the same time, there is no separate legal prohibition on processing a transaction simply because the money is intended to pay bail set by a court. Zakon
“Funds must be checked. If they are legal and their origin is confirmed, the payment must be processed. You cannot, instead of verification, simply block the very possibility of paying bail,” a ZN.UA interlocutor explained.
According to ZN.UA’s sources, in both cases the problem is the same — manual interference in the work of financial monitoring: earlier it could be used to circumvent controls, now — to block payments regardless of the funds’ origin.
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