The Odesa Regional Prosecutor's Office has reported suspicions against a former judge and his accomplices – a married couple who, according to the investigation, organized a fraudulent scheme for the illegal acquisition of apartments belonging to deceased owners through forged documents and court decisions.

It has been established that the couple approached the judge with a proposal to implement a mechanism for the illegal acquisition of real estate. They gathered information about apartments whose owners had died: personal data, characteristics of the housing, and its location. Based on this information, they produced fictitious purchase and sale agreements dated in previous years. According to these documents, ownership of the apartment allegedly transferred from the deceased to a proxy.

The former judge, who at that time was acting as the head of the district court, knowingly accepted the false nature of the documents and made decisions to satisfy civil claims. These decisions recognized the forged agreements as valid and created grounds for further illegal registration of the apartments.

Using this mechanism, three apartments in the Primorsky and Peresyp districts of Odesa were illegally re-registered. One of the spouses planned to sell them in 2022–2025. According to the appraisal expertise, the total value of these properties is nearly 3 million UAH.

To prevent their further alienation, the apartments have been seized at the request of the prosecutor's office.

The former judge is charged with aiding and abetting fraud on a particularly large scale and official forgery (Part 4 of Article 27, Article 190, Part 1 of Article 366 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine). Two of his accomplices have been notified of suspicion in organizing fraud and using forged documents (Part 4 of Article 190, Part 2 of Article 28, Part 4 of Article 358, Part 2 of Article 15, Part 2 of Article 209 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine).

The pre-trial investigation is being conducted by investigators from the territorial office of the State Bureau of Investigations located in Mykolaiv.

Note: According to Article 62 of the Constitution of Ukraine, a person is presumed innocent of committing a crime and cannot be subjected to criminal punishment until their guilt is proven in a lawful manner and established by a court verdict.