“Due to a pathological craving for gambling at the place of deployment of the military unit, he sought psychiatric help, received a referral for hospitalisation in a psychiatric hospital, but due to the nature of his service, he was unable to implement it.”
“There was a criminal intent to illegally use charitable donations for the purpose of obtaining a significant amount of profit during the period of martial law imposed on the territory of Ukraine. The suspect agreed with the statements of his defence counsel, noting that he suffers from a gambling addiction.”
“When applying to the court to recognise her son as having limited legal capacity, the applicant refers to the fact that her son is excessively addicted to gambling.”
What you have read is actual wording from court decisions. Threats to blow up everything, use of funds raised to help the Armed Forces for personal purposes, and requests for recognition of a person with limited legal capacity are the accompanying consequences of ludomania or gambling addiction.
This is reported in the investigation by Slidstvo.info. The video has English subtitles.
156 MILLION IN DECLARED WINNINGS
Gambling addiction is a type of addiction that involves a pathological passion for gambling. The problem was actively discussed in March of this year after a petition by military man Pavlo Petrychenko to restrict the operation of online casinos. The petition pointed to the danger of gambling for military personnel, who use it to cope with stress and can spend their entire allowance on gambling and take out microloans.
However, it is not only military personnel who place bets on sports and spin free spins (reels on slot machines — ed.). Slidstvo.Info has analysed the declarations of public officials and found that everyone from judges and prosecutors to employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and children of the National Security and Defence Council staff play.
In 2023, almost six and a half thousand public officials declared more than UAH 156 million in winnings from online casinos, lotteries and betting companies (sports betting — ed.).
Most often, officials declared winnings from SpaceX LLC (Cosmolot), Slots U.A. LLC, VBet Ukraine LLC, and GameDev LLC. As well as from the Parimatch gambling company, which was sanctioned by the National Security and Defence Council in March 2023.
THE BIGGEST WIN THAT MAY NOT BE REAL
Olha Khudyk, a patrol police officer of the Kosiv District Police Department in Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast, reported the largest win of almost UAH 44 million in her declaration. She also notes that this is her husband Oleh Khudyk’s prize, who works as an operative in the same district police department.
However, the lucky man’s declaration shows a win of only 20 thousand hryvnias, not 43 million.
“Now I’m going to call the guys who helped me fill out the declaration,” the policeman said during a phone conversation with Slidstvo.Info journalists. A few minutes later, the man called back and added that he hadn’t played at all during the year and that the prizes declared by him and his wife were a mistake. What could this all mean?
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Such “mistakes” may be the result of a tax evasion scheme: “Some casinos were throwing money at random people. This was discovered when people started preparing their tax returns and saw some income that had never been officially credited to their cards,” explains MP Yaroslav Zheleznyak.
Later, the National Police told Slidstvo.Info journalists that in her declaration, Olha Khudyk had confused the amount of her winnings with the code in the Unified State Register. The agency also stated that the amount of the winnings was actually UAH 20,000.
In early February, the Bureau of Economic Security seized UAH 700 million on the accounts of the Kosmolot gambling company, which is suspected of evading UAH 1.2 billion in taxes.
PARENTS AND CHILDREN
In addition to the officials themselves, their children also play in online casinos, and the officials reflect their winnings in their declarations.
Iryna Tymoshenko, the head of the critical infrastructure security service at the National Security and Defence Council, declared a little over UAH 2,000 in winnings for her daughter, Kateryna Tymoshenko, who also holds a government position at the State Special Communications Service.
In a commentary to journalists, the woman explained that she has a negative attitude towards online casinos and has “never participated in them”.
Roman Svitlychnyi is a judge of the Zarichna District Court of the Rivne oblast. In 2023, he declared three winnings of his son Oleh totalling over UAH 70 thousand.
The official explains that his son lost a lot of credibility because of his winnings: “He won so much that his mother and I had to pay his salary. We paid sixty thousand. He played in casinos, lost, then took out loans, and so on in a circle.”
The judge adds that now his son has improved and is working as a state bailiff.
EXCITEMENT AND JUSTICE
Why people decide to play in online casinos or place bets on sports is a personal decision. Viktoriia Kurnytska, a judge of the Skole District Court of the Lviv oblast, explains her gambling by negative events in her life.
“I have not been gambling since March. I was in a depressive state, so I played. I didn’t have a loss, so I decided to stop on this happy note. I’m mentally healthy,” says the head of the court.
Another representative of the justice system who declares prizes is Bohdan Butskyi, a prosecutor of the Sokal Department of the Chervonohrad District Prosecutor’s Office. In 2023, he declared a win of UAH 891,000.
During a conversation with journalists of Slidstvo.Info, Butskyi explains that this is not a one-time win, but various winnings throughout the year.
“I could have the app open outside of work, and spend about an hour and a half a day on it. If I turn back the clock, I can say that it takes nerves. I was on a business trip in Donetsk Oblast at the time, and when I came home in the evening, I had to do something to occupy myself, so I spent so much time on it,” the prosecutor explains.
ALTERNATIVE WAYS OF EARNING MONEY
In the process of communicating with government officials, it turned out that the impetus for sports betting and slot machine launch is not always excitement. Sometimes, the reason is trivial — the search for additional sources of income.
This version was voiced by Vitaliy Nykonenko, head of the HR department at the Izyum District State Administration. In 2023 alone, the man declared two prizes — UAH 335,000 from the state lottery operator MSL and almost UAH 118,000 from the betting company FAVBET.
“Why does a civil servant have to look for additional income that is allowed by law? There is not enough salary for the family, and public service is a calling,” the official said during a conversation with journalists.
Looking at Nykonenko’s declarations for previous years, one can see that he has been playing and winning for quite some time. For example, in 2022, he declared UAH 118,000 in winnings from the aforementioned MSL company, and in 2021, he received UAH 35,000 from the Parimatch bookmaker and almost UAH 730,000 from the same MSL company, Molodsportloto.
According to the declarations of previous years, Vitalii Nykonenko received his first win in 2018 — almost UAH 20 thousand from the national lottery “Favorit-Sport”.
“I’ll tell you this – it was my old hobby. I had to turn to it. I’m not the kind of person who takes bribes or something else from somewhere and then declares it as income. You are looking in the wrong place. In 2017, I got married, had a child, and the income I was receiving was not enough. Officially, I have no right to engage in entrepreneurial activity, so yes,” Nykonenko says about his winnings.
It is noteworthy that in 2022, the man began to indicate financial obligations – he currently has 17 declared loans totalling more than UAH 250,000, some of which he has already repaid.
“All cases follow the same scenario: at first, a person plays, for example, just wants to make money, then throws money in, then there is no money, loans start, hobbies, family and everything else is destroyed. Most often, it ends up with the whole family and all relatives saving up money and paying off the loan for 10 years,” psychiatrist Oleksii Krapyvka says about gambling addiction.
The doctor also adds that in countries where people’s income is low, people gamble not just to play, but to make money: “You should never gamble if you want to make money – it’s not about the game anymore.”
REGISTER OF PROBLEM GAMBLERS
According to the information of KRGL, the Commission for the Regulation of Gambling and Lotteries, as of 19 June 2024, the so-called Register of Problem Gamblers contains information about 7,739 people.
Out of more than 6,500 declarations with winnings, more than a thousand officials indicated that they had won in two different places, 214 people declared prizes from three casinos, 50 officials “successfully tried their luck” in four gambling firms, four “successfully spun their wheels” in five places at once, and three were lucky enough to win in six computer programs in between jobs at taxpayers’ expense.
Roman Chumak, deputy commander of Platoon 2 (rapid response) of the Special Police Company of the Volyn Oblast National Police, lists winnings from four online casinos in his 2023 declaration: UAH 45,600 from SpaceX LLC, UAH 279,000 from Native Apps, UAH 28,000 from VBET Ukraine, and almost UAH 4,000 from GameDev LLC.
In a conversation with journalists, the man said that he had taken a self-imposed self-restraint from gambling.
“It’s better not to hang on to it. I have already submitted everything. There is KRGL, they block you everywhere: you can neither register nor play anywhere.”
Psychiatrist Oleksii Krapyvka emphasises that the official statistics of gambling addicts are not true: “We don’t know where the line between normal and pathology is. The most common and worst case is when a person already has debts of such a magnitude that they cannot repay them. This is a completely destroyed mental health, the inability to do anything and the need to die to close it all.”
TAXATION AND THE FUTURE
Slidstvo.Info previously reported that in 2023, the gambling business showed revenues of UAH 53 billion, which, in turn, is three times less than the National Bank of Ukraine’s estimate.
At the end of May, the Verkhovna Rada passed in the first reading a law on strengthening control over the gambling business and liquidating the KRGL.
In addition to restricting gambling advertising (the procedure for this was adopted a month later by the Cabinet of Ministers), the law also provides for the introduction of counteraction to prohibited gambling and the establishment of criteria for revoking licence of gambling organisers.
MP Yaroslav Zheleznyak claims that there is a problem with tax evasion and the fact that casinos with some connection to Russia, both official and unofficial, are still operating.
In his Telegram channel, Zheleznyak writes that “in the first 5 months of 2024, the budget received UAH 7.38 billion from the gambling business, which is 101 times more than in January-May 2021, and three times more than in the same period in 2023.”
“It is necessary to ensure that non-payment of taxes automatically leads to the loss of a licence. We need to introduce an online monitoring system, close financial gateways, restrict advertising, and reboot KRGL,” Zheleznyak says.
