According to the investigation, in June 2023, a local resident was brought to one of the district police departments in Kharkiv, where law enforcement officers discovered about 1 kg of cannabis in his car. While there, the man confessed that he had purchased the narcotic substance through a “Telegram” channel for the purpose of further sale.

Taking advantage of the situation, the head of the criminal police department's sector, along with his subordinate, an operative officer, made a corrupt proposal to the detainee. For a monetary reward, they promised to create conditions for the qualification of his actions by the investigators not as a serious crime under Article 307 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine, but as a significantly lesser offense under Article 309 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine, by altering the data regarding the quantity of the narcotic substance.

To avoid having suspicious deposits on his own card, the chief involved a friend of his, an employee of a pharmacy. It was to his bank card that the drug dealer transferred 66,000 hryvnias of unlawful benefit. He convinced him that the funds were supposedly the salaries of police officers participating in the resistance against the armed aggression of the Russian Federation in the Kharkiv region. In reality, the withdrawn money was handed over in cash directly to the head of the sector and distributed between him and the operative officer.

As a result, criminal proceedings against the drug dealer were opened under the "necessary" article — part 1 of Article 309 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine instead of drug trafficking.

Under the procedural guidance of the Kharkiv Regional Prosecutor's Office, both police officers were notified of suspicion for receiving unlawful benefits for themselves for actions taken in the interests of the person providing such benefits, using the power granted to them, committed by a group of persons in collusion (part 3 of Article 368 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine), while the drug dealer was charged for providing such benefits (part 1 of Article 369 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine).

At the prosecutor's request, preventive measures in the form of detention were chosen for the two law enforcement officers.

The pre-trial investigation is being conducted by investigators from the second investigative department (located in Kharkiv) of the State Bureau of Investigation in Poltava, with operational support from the Security Service of Ukraine in the Kharkiv region.

According to Article 62 of the Constitution of Ukraine, a person is presumed innocent until proven guilty in a lawful manner and established by a guilty verdict of the court.