Kyiv police have uncovered and arrested members of a criminal group, which reportedly assisted individuals on the wanted list to receive Ukrainian citizenship.
Kyiv city’s Prosecutor General’s Office (PGO) said on June 12 that investigators had established that members of the group hatched plots involving Ukraine’s State Migration Service, to which forged documents were proffered to receive Ukrainian citizenship. The scheme involved fictitious marriages with Ukrainian women.
“Their goal was to hasten the process of marriage registration, to submit to territorial branches of the marriage offices fake documents testifying to the pregnancy of these women. During the course of a month, the marriages were dissolved and the suspects retained the surnames of their spouses. In addition, several individuals faked their deaths in Ukraine in order to be taken off Russia’s wanted list,” the PGO’s press service said.
The suspects facilitated the legalization and documentation of five foreign citizens on the wanted list for committing serious and very serious crimes. Among them were the ex-head of the Russian Interior Ministry’s logistic support office, aide to the Russian deputy interior ministry, who wanted for embezzlement, his accomplice, as well as the organizer [of the scheme] and participants of these organizations and other persons.
Four suspects have been detained and notified of suspicion of committing crimes.
“In addition, a large number of internal and international passports from several countries along with fake residency permits, work identification cards and more than Hr 230,000, $134,000, more than 14,000 euro and RUB 140,000 were seized from the suspects. The investigation continues,” the press release says.
