Case description
The HACC found former Mayor of Chornomorsk Valerii Khmelniuk, State Water Agency official Valerii Babchuk, and First Deputy Head of the State Water Agency Mykhailo Khoriev not guilty of land manipulation in the aquatory of the Port of Chornomorsk.
According to the investigation, following an application submitted in 2015 by the private company Risoil Terminal, Khmelniuk initiated and signed a city council resolution granting and approving a land-management project for the allocation of a 0.79-hectare land plot.
Formally, the land was presented as being allocated for the construction and operation of engineering and transport infrastructure facilities. In reality, however, this land plot is located within the aquatory of the seaport, a territory classified as state-owned water-fund land, which may not be transferred into municipal ownership or leased to private entities.
Despite the fact that the plot was in the permanent use of Chornomorsk Sea Trade Port and constituted an object of national importance, Mayor Khmelniuk, according to the prosecution, did not suspend the council’s decision, did not return it for reconsideration, and knowingly signed documents that enabled the aquatory to be leased to a private company.
After the project was approved in April 2018, the land plot was registered as municipal property, and a 49-year lease agreement was subsequently concluded between the city council and Risoil Terminal.
According to the prosecution, Babchuk deliberately prepared and endorsed an unlawful positive conclusion for the land-management project for Risoil Terminal. Khoriev allegedly organized and approved the unlawful coordination of the land-management project. It was he who initiated the transfer of documents to Babchuk and signed the illegal positive conclusion.
Investigators estimated that, as a result of these actions, the land plot and the water body were unlawfully removed from state ownership, causing state losses exceeding UAH 24.6 million.
However, the defense argued that all defendants had acted within the scope of their official powers, and that the disputed land belonged to municipal ownership, meaning that no state land had been unlawfully alienated. The defendants insisted that the State Water Agency only verifies compliance of land-management projects with water legislation, does not determine land category, and has no obligation to state that a plot is located within a port aquatory.
Khmelniuk emphasized that a mayor does not make land-allocation decisions single-handedly, but merely signs city council resolutions that have passed legal and sectoral approval. He maintained that there were no indicators of illegality in the land-allocation decisions.
The defendants were charged under Article 364(2) and Article 366(1) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.
However, the HACC acquitted all three defendants. The court held that they acted within their lawful authority, and that the prosecution failed to prove that their decisions contradicted the interests of service or were aimed at unlawfully removing the port aquatory from state ownership. The court also found that the claim of “removal of the aquatory” was unsubstantiated, as the council decision concerned a land plot only, not the water space.
The case is currently under appellate review.
